The other day I posted my review of Never Back Down (although, I highly advise that you DO back down from that movie, but I covered that LAST time)...and...alot of other reviews for the film I’ve read have appalled me. They didn’t say anything retarded like it was good or anything, but they did say something that is sooooo wrong. They called it Fight Club Jr. My reply to that is, have they actually SEEN Fight Club?

For those not in the know, Fight Club was a 1996 film adaptation of the book of the same name by Chuck Palahniuk starring Brad Pitt (in one of his few GOOD roles) and Edward Norton. [From Wikipedia:]



The narrator (Edward Norton) is an automobile company employee who travels to accident sites to perform product recall cost appraisals. His doctor refuses to write a prescription for his insomnia and instead suggests that he visit a support group for testicular cancer victims in order to appreciate real suffering. By attending the group, the narrator feels important and cared for and then is able to sleep soundly and subsequently fakes more illnesses so he can attend other support groups. The narrator’s routine is disrupted when he begins to notice another impostor, Marla Singer (Helena Bonham Carter), at the groups he goes to and his insomnia returns.

During a flight for a business trip, the narrator meets Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt), who is a soap salesman. The narrator arrives home to find his apartment has been destroyed by an explosion. He calls Tyler and meets him at a bar. Tyler agrees to let the narrator stay at his home on the condition that the narrator hits him. The narrator complies and the two end up enjoying a fist fight outside the bar. The narrator moves in with Tyler and the two return to the bar, where they have another fight in the parking lot. After attracting a crowd, they establish a ’fight club’ in the bar’s basement. Soon, other fight clubs are established around the country, with Tyler’s help.

When Marla overdoses on Xanax, she is rescued by Tyler and the two embark upon a sexual relationship. Tyler tells the narrator never to talk about him with Marla. Under Tyler’s leadership, the fight club becomes "Project Mayhem," which commits increasingly destructive acts of anti-capitalist vandalism in the city. The fight clubs become a network for Project Mayhem, and the narrator is left out of Tyler’s activities with the project. After an argument, Tyler disappears from the narrator’s life and when a member of Project Mayhem dies on a mission, the narrator attempts to shut down the project. Tracing Tyler’s steps, he travels around the country to find that fight clubs have been started in every city, where one of the participants identifies him as Tyler Durden. A phone call to Marla confirms his identity and he realizes that Tyler is an alter ego of his own split personality. Tyler appears before him and explains that he controls the narrator’s body whenever he is asleep.

The narrator faints and awakes to find Tyler has made several phone calls during his blackout and traces his plans to the downtown headquarters of several major credit card companies, which Tyler intends to destroy in order to cripple the financial networks. Failing to find help with the police, many of whom are members of Project Mayhem, the narrator attempts to disarm the explosives in the basement of one of the buildings. He is confronted by Tyler, knocked unconscious, and taken to the upper floor of another building to witness the impending destruction. The narrator, held by Tyler at gunpoint, realizes that in sharing the same body with Tyler, he is the one who is actually holding the gun. He fires it into his mouth, shooting through the cheek without killing himself. The illusion of Tyler collapses with an exit wound to the back of his head. Shortly after, members of Project Mayhem bring a kidnapped Marla to the narrator and leave them alone. The bombs detonate and, holding hands, the two witness the destruction of the entire financial city block through the windows.

Now...pop quiz kiddies. What about that is resemblant of Never Back Down? The retarded answer (the only answer POSSIBLE)? "Duh...they both involve fighting?" That’s the ONLY SIMILARITY! And Fight Club isn’t even ABOUT fighting. It’s art. Art that INVOLVES fighting, much like The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (another excellent Pitt movie by the way). Fight Club is philosophical, albeit Nihilistic. Never Back Down’s most philosophical moment came when I realized how barbaric we are for an "enlightened" age. And that never even comes up in the film. That came up in my head. Never Back Down is a pile of garbage which resembles The Fast and the Furious mixed with The Karate Kid. There are NO elements of Fight Club in it. It’s not a masterpiece of film making. I admit, the quality WAS better than I thought it’d be technical-wise, but it wasn’t a masterpiece like Fight Club. And in Fight Club, we have character development. We have a plot. We have one of the biggest plot twists since "No, Luke, I AM your father." The actors in Fight Club rocked. The actors in Never Back Down were LIKE rocks.

So Fight Club Jr.? Not so much.