"Fight Club" (1999) - REVIEW

When I saw Zodiac back at the beginning of 2007, I made it my mission to remember the director's name and see what other movies he had directed. Unfortunately, with so many other good films to see from last year, I got sidetracked, and only remembered my "mission" when I made my nominations for the "Texan" awards, and deemed Zodiac worthy of a Best Director nomination. After five seconds of research (thanks Internet!) I found the name I was looking for: David Fincher. I looked at his filmography and was surprised to see that he directed two movies that I had heard about and seen posters/dvds countless times, but never had any idea they were directed by the same man. Those two films are Seven(1995), and Fight Club(1999). I didn't really know when I was going to find time to rent either of the two movies, but fate had something else in mind. In the last five minutes of my Algebra II class, one of my friends asked me if I had seen Fight Club. I said no, but that I wanted to, and without hesitation he pulled out the dvd from his backpack. Now, after sitting down for almost 2 and a half hours, I'm glad to say that Mr. Fincher has impressed me yet again, even though I'm still scratching my head about a few things. I won't give away too much about the plot, seeing as well....maybe I should just stop there. A bit of advice: don't do any "background research" before seeing the film, because you could ruin part of it. Nevertheless the film is hugely entertaining, wonderfully acted, brilliantly directed, and uses music to a brilliant and somewhat unnerving effect. Just like in Zodiac, the cinematography features very similar, yet still subtly different uses of muted greens, grey-blues, and softly filtered light (specifically from things like street lamps) to give many scenes an odd, grungy sort of "glow". The story...well, don't let the title fool you. By the time it's over you won't know what hit you. Edward Norton is absolutely amazing and so are Brad Pitt (who I'm not the biggest fan of) and Helena Bonham Carter. While I think Zodiac is the superior movie, Fight Club easily wins in the acting department. I am Jordan's badly rushed/written review.

Grade: A

Nominations (for 99 obviously): Best Picture (#2), Best Director - David Fincher (#2), Best Actor - Edward Norton (#1 WINNER), Best Actor - Brad Pitt (#3), Best Supporting Actress - Helena Bonham Carter (#2), Best Adapted Screenplay(#1 WINNER), Best Editing (#2), Best Cinematography (#1 WINNER), Best Sound Editing/Mixing (#1 WINNER)