One of the greatest films of all time?

Yeah fair enough. I agree that both are hip innovative flicks. I also have no problem with you not liking it. The more I think about it, the more I realise it's innate ability to divide or for lack of a better word marginalize it's viewer. I just happen to be a superfan.

I guess I kinda understand. But to tell you the truth I know people, close friends, I hate to admit. People who get into fights a lot. It's not the constant trip to the doctor or dentist you envisage. Most the time it is painful, but for sure walkawayable from. The truth is pain can be pleasurable, just cause it ain't your cup of tea doesn't mean it ain't someone else's.

Hat tip: Wuchak! 🙂

The problem is that because it's dealing with an esoteric subject--psychosis--it's inaccessible to most people.

I think the best way to go into it may very well be just thinking it's some fighting movie. Granted, that's not good for baiting people into watching it. But those shallow expectations can result in quite the holy sh*t moment when you actually see what you're in for haha.

Personally, I always enjoyed the split-personality thing. Aside from the surprise of it (which I loved), there was also the interesting meta tie-in to the fact that the character is played by Brad Pitt. We notice, earlier in the film, Tyler pointing towards a Calvin Klein (or Tommy Hilfiger?) poster and the characters scoff at the perfect body of the model and these unrealistic goals that men are being told to achieve (my interpretation, admittedly). Meanwhile, this model had the near exact body of Pitt. We hear Tyler directly stating things about how we're not going to be millionaires and movie gods; Pitt, the actor, being the epitome of both. And how, generally speaking, Brad Pitt is sort of the perfect embodiment of an unrealistic goal that other men wish they could be.

Watching the movie for the first time, these comments made by Tyler can seem kinda funny coming from Brad Pitt. Hearing him trash all of the things this real-life actor is/represents. But then it turns out the joke is on us. Tyler really IS an unrealistic goal. He's not real at all. He's just a shallow manifestation of what the Narrator wishes he was. He's just like that put-on clever personality the Narrator exhibits on the plane. Or the false image of completeness that he wanted his condo to give the appearance of. Tyler, looking like Brad Pitt, is just the last phony image that he's holding onto.

If all of this was intended, I don't know. But it's kinda how I saw it. Interestingly, Pitt may even be real in this universe. You actually see Seven Years In Tibet playing at a theater in one scene.

As far as the homosexual stuff goes, I was never really on board with that. I realize the writer was gay, but I don't think anything gay was meant to be implied with the characters. I can't remember what was said on the DVD commentaries (it's been a while) but it even seems like this fact may've been addressed by either Fincher or Palahniuk. Again, though, it's been a while. Maybe I'm remembering wrong.

What exactly does "radically against any hate group" mean? Are you infiltrating hate groups and taking them down from within? lol
I doubt that you are even actively against hate groups, never-mind radically. Also, i pickup on hate in your own response. Why point out that democrats started the KKK (a misleading statement and not fit for this message board)? It's completely irrelevant to today's' politics. Attempting to identify the democratic party today by actions in the 1800's is irrational at best and propaganda at worst. To label liberalism as fascist is just more hate. For someone so radically against hate groups you sure seem comfortable with some of their rhetoric.

I don't think ANTIFA, Proud Boys, or KKK are groups that anyone should be aligned with, all of them radical in their own ways.

Also, to bring this back around to, I don't know....Fight Club, it's pretty clear at the end of the film that Norton's character rejects Tyler's philosophy.

Thanks Abed. My two older brothers usually vote Dem, but we get along just fine with lotsa laughing. Sometimes we debate the issues and disagree, but we still respect each other as human beings with the right to choose.