English 3B Assignment 1 - Fight Club PDF

Preview

Summary

Assignment on Fight Club movie....

Description

B.A.G 3

ENGLISH 3B ASSIGNMENT 1 ENGL7312

CONTENTS PAGE

QUESTION 3 – FIGHT CLUB………………………………………………………………………2 Q1 CONTINUED……………………………………………………………………………………….3 Q1 CONTINUED……………………………………………………………………………………….4 Q1 CONTINUED……………………………………………………………………………………….5 Q1 CONTINUED……………………………………………………………………………………….6 BIBLIOGRAPHY / REFERENCES………………………………………………………………….7

1

QUESTION 3 – FIGHT CLUB

An analysis of David Fincher’s 1999 film, Fight Club, which challenges the viewer to examine the Postmodern world in which they occupy. Postmodernism is a late twentieth century concept in the arts and criticism, which is a departure from modernism and is characterised by the self-conscious use of earlier conventions and styles. (Duignan, 2018). People are predisposed by the world in which they live in, as it influences and shapes their thinking. The postmodern world describes a worldview or a paradigm. Postmodernism is a state of mind and is the prevailing mindset of society (Hawke, 2010). In Fincher’s film, Fight Club, the audience witness how the protagonist is influenced by the world around him as well as his attitudes and mindset. The men in Fight Club are desperate to find meaning beyond their dreary, normal lives so they embark on a deranged, adrenaline rushed journey involving their bare-knuckles. The objectives of this essay will be to explain the historical context of Fight Club in a postmodern society, secondly, the filmic techniques that Fincher uses in the film will be examined, as well as the metanarrative methods that were used in the film, which includes the depiction of an unreliable narrator and Fincher’s postmodern approach to gender relations and identities will be analysed. The statement that Peter Travers (1999) wrote in the Rolling Stone Magazine about Fincher’s film, Fight Club is an interesting statement as the film intends to draw the viewer in and captures their attention from the minute it is viewed and to grasp the storyline and context of the characters. The film is captivating as the motives of the protagonist are always scrutinised by the audience as Tyler slowly influences and manipulates him into questioning his own identity and life choices. The film challenges the audiences’ prejudices as the viewers start to put together all the pieces of this complex film, such as when the protagonist attends the support groups in an attempt to have a peaceful night’s sleep, or when he enjoys fighting with Tyler outside the bar, it is almost as if he is fighting with himself. This film definitely rocks the audience’s world as the more the protagonist searches for Tyler when he suddenly disappears one day, the protagonist gains meaning and understanding that he is in fact Tyler Durden. The audience is left with a crossword puzzle that is slowly getting solved the more the film draws to an end. The film leaves the viewer laughing in the face of an abyss as the ending scene has a touch of humour as the protagonist shot himself in the throat, but he still insists that he is fine and talks as if he feels no pain. When the corporate buildings collapse, the protagonist and Marla look at it whilst holding hands as if they are staring into a mesmerizing sunset in a tropical destination. This adds humour to the movie because the more the audience realises what actions the characters are taking, the more absurd and comedic the film portrays itself to be. The movie is alive as the visually intriguing brutal violence of the men in Fight Club, causes the audience veins to rush with adrenaline as if they are in the film itself, as the narrator states, “You aren’t alive anywhere like you’re alive in Fight Club”. (Fight Club, 1999). The sexuality, nudity and obscene language add to the liveliness of the movie. The utmost threat to young viewers watching the movie is the self-inflicted 2

pain which serves as a worthy high (Smithouser, 2018). Travers goes on to state that Fincher’s Fight Club is an uncompromising American classic, due to the nature of the famous celebrities like Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, Meat Loaf, Jared Leto and Helena Bonham Carter all starring in this movie. In the end of the movie where the collapsing of the buildings take place, it could be viewed as a reference to the Twin Towers collapsing that took place on 11 September 2001. Just like the Islamic terrorists Al-Qaeda were responsible for the 9/11 attacks, Tyler Durden and the members of Fight Club were responsible for the corporate buildings exploding. This ties in with the American classic statement that was made by Peter Travers. The historical context of this film involves the satire of the rise of consumerism over the course of the post-war American history. In conjunction with World War II, America had become the world’s wealthiest and most authoritative country, where the typical American was seen as more prosperous than wealthy people in other countries. With this opulence in America, alienation arrived as well, as some Americans had confessed to feeling as if their lives were meaningless, although they did not lack anything materialistically, they felt as if they had nothing to live for. Therefore, the key theme of Fight Club is “the alienation of prosperity” (Litcharts, 2018). The narrator states that he feels like he is living in “a state of perpetual déjà vu” (Fight Club, 1999). He means to say that the only way he feels fully alive, is through physical pain (Fight Club, 1999). Tyler Durden emphasises this in the chemical burn scene. Tyler relates that in order to feel alive and in touch with reality, you have to feel physical pain, just like how the narrator felt the pain when he got seared with the chemical. Fight Club is seen as an anachrony, where there is a difference between the arrangement in the story and the chronology of the fabula (Bal, 2009, p.82). Fight Club moves back and forth from past to present with the narrator telling the audience all that has transpired. Fincher uses many different filmic techniques in order to create the postmodern fiction of Fight Club. One of the most effective cinematographic techniques for representing the anachrony of the film is the montage. An example of this would be that the narrator is seen as a millennial man where he is wearing Calvin Klein clothing and does his shopping at IKEA. However, Tyler dresses up like he is from the 1970s, with his big fur coat and big sunglasses, this was the era where masculinity was seen as the ultimate form of power. Tyler’s fighting style is also seen as something out of a martial arts film. (Ten, 2018). Cinematography is used in the film by the director drawing attention to the objects that possess the greatest significance, which are extreme close-up shots and the arrangement of people. (White, 2007). The men’s support group is an example of this and the close-up shot of the narrator when he gets a phone call from Marla. (Fight Club, 1999). The portrayal of violence is condensed with the shaky camera cinematographic technique which is used to create tension in the film, just like in the end scene where the narrator and Tyler were fighting. (Thompson, 2014). Editing is used in the film to create the overall story line of the Fight Club, such as when Tyler appears in the beginning of the movie in the scene where the narrator is at the photocopy machine and when he mentions the word “copy”, and when the narrator goes to see the doctor regarding g his insomnia and Tyler appears when the 3

doctor mentions the word “pain”. (Fight Club, 1999). Tyler is edited into these scenes of the film. Fight Club was made using digital film editing, with tools such as Avid. (White, 2007). The use of splicing up different frames and cutting it and editing them in the film was done, just like how Tyler displayed his editing skills when he worked as a projectionist in his spare time. (White, 2007). The editor also makes use of flashbacks to bring the movie all together at the end. Various camera angles were used in the film, such as high angled shots, which made the subject feel smaller implying that they are harmless, like the scene where Tyler speaks over the commissioner in the bathroom. The commissioner is vulnerable in this situation. The audience also sees a wide angle shot by the reflection of the mirrors in the bathroom when Tyler pulls the commissioner in. The low angle shot is used to show dominance and give the subject power or respect. In the scene where the narrator was punching Angel Face, this showed the narrator being in control of the fight. The eye-level camera angle gives clarity to the objects on screen and is less dramatic, such as the scene with the narrator and Marla talking to one another. (Becker, 2015). The use of long shots, close-ups, medium shots and extreme close-ups throughout the film intensifies the plot which creates summits of intense action and channels of mellow dialogue. (Silverstein, 2017). Furthermore, sound design is used in the film to add an extra depth of realism which increases the power of the fight scenes. The job of the sound designer is to create the same experience you see with your eyes, but with your ears. (Fusco, 2017). The exaggerated punch sound effects add to the realism of the violence and fighting scenes that the audience experiences in Fight Club. In the scene where the narrator punches Angel Face continuously when he knows he should have stopped, the music stops playing which makes the punches sound more intense and violent. The main song in Fight Club that was used was ‘Where is my mind’ by The Pixies. This song is ironic because the narrator, is imagining Tyler and he constantly questions himself throughout the film. (Becker, 2015). The use of lighting in the film involves low key lighting such as when they are in the basement in Fight Club, all you see is darkness but tinges of light peering through and the cold fluorescent streetlights where the audience views the characters’ faces and can see their emotions and movement. High key lighting is used in the film when the narrator is in his office, the audience can see that his office is very bright and that everything is white, this emphasises the dark circles that the viewer sees under the narrator’s eyes and the brightness from the lights strains the audiences eyes which allows the audience members to put themselves in the narrator’s shoes which is associated with tiredness. (Becker, 2015). Metanarrative techniques such as Marxism is applied to Fight Club, as we see the narrator who is a member of the capitalist society, rejecting the ideals of his way of life and turning to the binary opposite way of life. For example, when the narrator’s apartment was a perfect imitation of a magazine catalogue, he then turned to live with Tyler in a squatted house in a run-down area of town. (Becker, 2015). Another example is when the narrator cared about his appearance and wore designer wear, he chose to fit in with society and after he met Tyler, he disfigured himself due to all the fighting, therefore he stood out. Before, he had been a nameless individual and 4

after creating Fight Club, he had multiple personalities, one of which was his alter ego, Tyler. (Becker, 2015). Since Fight Club is merely a depiction of one possible truth, the protagonist is not expected to present anything but his subjective version of it; or, his two versions of it, if the narrator and Tyler are considered to be two separate beings. This brings us to a trope of postmodern fiction which is the unreliable narrator. (IIE Module Guide, 2018, p.43). Fight Club becomes a metanarrative in itself as it initiates from an underground assembly of supressed individuals, where it soon spills over into mainstream society and transforms into a broad cult, where the members are fully absorbed in. (Mo, 2010). An unreliable narrator raises many questions about the subject of the story and about the narrative devices by which the story is conveyed. Fincher’s Fight Club hints at the possibility that everybody is all somehow schizophrenic, in that they have different aspects of themselves that could modify the course of their lives. The narrative frame takes on a double meaning in film, because it refers both to the literal frame of the camera, as well as the metaphorical frame through which the audience views the characters. (IIE Module Guide, 2018, p.43). Postmodernist directors use the frame to provide a critical distance from which the audience can evaluate the action for themselves, because they cannot rely on the narrator to provide a reliable interpretation for themselves. Therefore, Fight Club was told in a subjective version because the narrator was viewed as being unreliable due to the nature that he had split personalities. The narrative frame takes on a double meaning in Fight Club, because it refers to the literal frame of the camera, and the metaphorical frame through which the audience views the characters. (IIE Module Guide, 2018, p.43). the film basically is about how the narrator thinks and what his thought processes lead to. When the narrator says, “Everything is a copy, of a copy, of a copy”, it makes sense to say that his view of the world is less like reality and more as if he is living in a movie. (Fight Club, 1999) (Becker, 2015). The narrator often does refer to his life as being that of a movie because after he realises that Tyler is himself, he passes out and the audience hears his voice over saying “It’s called a changeover. The movie goes on, and nobody in the audience has any idea.” (Fight Club, 1999). Up until the last scene in the film, where the audience finds out that the narrator is in fact Tyler, it becomes evident at this point that the narrator’s point of view cannot be trusted. (Johnson, 2015). Virtually all the characters in Fight Club are men, besides Marla Singer. The film examines the state of masculinity in modern times. The film suggests that modern society undermines men by forcing them to live consumerist lives. In short, the film depicts the men it portrays, such as “Jack”, as being so emasculated that he has forgotten what being a “real man” means. His intense love of furniture adds to the feminine characteristics he often displays. The narrator has adopted feminine concepts in order to adapt to society. The narrator loved his furniture, as he said, “If I saw something clever, like a little coffee table in the shape of a yin-yang, I had to have it”. (Fight Club, 1999). The narrator is displaying feminine characteristics because it is unlikely that grown men take a liking to collecting furniture. He goes on to say, “I’d flip through catalogues and wonder, what kind of dining set defines me as 5

a person?” (Fight Club, 1999). Tyler represents masculinity and dresses flashy, whereas the Narrator is seen as the more sensitive traditional man who is conservative and falls as a victim to femininity. Both the Narrator and Tyler cannot live in co-existence. However, the audience sees Bob, who is also known as Robert Paulsen, who is a symbol of innocence. It is highly unlikely that we see a big man of this stature have women features such as breasts when he was once known as a bodybuilder. The support group for men with testicular cancer that the Narrator attends shows the audience that the grown men all display feminine characteristics such as crying and hugging one another, this strips them away from their masculinity. Fight Club represents masculinity, as the men are all trapped in a consumer society which has robbed them of their individuality. The men have no power over their lives and Fight Club was a way for them to claim their masculinity. Fight Club’s purpose was to allow men to rediscover their raw masculinity. Violence is seen as a form of masculinity. In the postmodern world, there was a loss of masculinity and the men thought that this world had caused their self-identities to fracture. The club offers men a thrilling sense of life that the rest of their existence lacks. When Project Mayhem was invented, Tyler did not care if other people got hurt. The goal was to teach each man in the project that he had the power to control history. (Fight Club, 1999). “The first rule about Fight Club is you don’t talk about Fight Club”. (Fight club, 1999), one of the famous lines spoken by the men of Fight Club. In Fight Club, everyone was seen as a carbon copy. The Narrator’s feelings for Marla suggest a substitute to pure, unfiltered masculinity, and therefore a critique of the characters’ misogyny. (Becker, 2015). Marla often reflects back at the Narrator and how detached he is from reality. Marla is a strong female character and is confident and is in far more control of her life than the Narrator is of his life. Marla accepts life and portrays self-awareness, whereas the Narrator lacks the confidence in himself. The Narrator has not made a life for himself, only on his apartment which he focuses on. The answer to society’s problems is not to go back in the conflicting route and be hyper-masculine, but to embrace values that are stereotypically masculine, like strength, and some that are stereotypically feminine, such as compassion, and values that are not masculine or feminine, but simply human. Fincher’s Fight Club aims to achieve the overall sense of how humanity and life decisions should be portrayed.

(2805 words).

6

References Fincher, D. (dir.) 1999. Fight Club. DVD Region 2. 20th Century Fox. Bal, M. 2009. Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative, 3rd Edition. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. pp.165–175 IIE Module Guide. 2018. ENGL7312 Postmodernism. Anderson, E. 2010. “Telling Stories: Unreliable Discourse, Fight Club, and the Cinematic Narrator”, Journal of Narrative Theory 40(1), pp.80–107. [Online]. Available at: https://muse.jhu.edu/article/383457/pdf [Accessed on: 17/08/2018]. Kinder, E. and Pender, P. 2014. “A copy of a copy of a copy: Framing the double in Fight Club”, Literature Film Quarterly 42(3), pp.541–556. [Online]. Available at: https://www.academia.edu/26392854/A_copy_of_a_copy_of_a_ copy_Framing_the_double_in_fight_club [Accessed on: 17/08/2018]. Hawke, G. 2010. “Living in a Postmodern World”. [Online]. Available at: https://www.georgesjournal.net [Accessed on: 17/08/2018]. Duignan, H. 2018. “Postmodernism”. [Online]. Available at: https://www.britannica.com/topic/postmodernism-philosophy [Accessed on: 17/08/2018]. Croome, A. s.a. Fight Club and Postmodernism [Online]. Available at: http://www.chuckpalahniuk.net/files/papers/fight-club-andrewcroome.pdf [Accessed on: 17/08/2018]. Bedford, M. 2011. “Smells like 1990s spirit: The dazzling deception of Fight Club’s grunge-aesthetic”, New Cinemas: Journal of Contemporary Film, 9(1), pp.49–63. [Online]. Available on EBSCOhost at: https://ezproxy.iielearn.ac.za/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com /login.aspx? direct=true&db=ufh&AN=79682491&site=ehost-live [Accessed on: 17/08/2018]. Smithouser, B. 2018. “Plugged In Fight Club Movie Review”. [Online]. Available at: https://pluggedin.com/movie-reviews/fightclub/ [Accessed on: 20/08/2018]. Litcharts, G. 2018. “Historical Context of David Fincher’s Film”. [Online]. Available at: https://www.litcharts.com [Accessed on: 20/08/2018]. White, S. 2007. “Cinematic Techniques of Fight Club by David Fincher”. [Online]. Available at: https://www.cinema4movie.blogspot.com [Accessed on: 20/08/2018]. Becker, J. 2015. “Fight Club Movie Analysis”. [Online]. Available at: https://www.prezi.com [Accessed on: 20/08/2018]. Silverstein, K. 2017. “Fight Club Explores New Hollywood Style”. [Online]. Available at: https://www.emorywheel.com [Accessed on: 21/08/2018]. Fusco, J. 2017. “Fight Club Demonstrates the Visceral Power of Sound Design”. [Online]. Available at: https://www.nofilmschool.com [Accessed on: 21/08/2018].

7...