The beloved film adaptation of Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club was released 16 years ago today, on 15th October 1999.
Directed by David Fincher, Fight Club remains one of the most controversial films of the 90s. The film tells the story of a bored, ‘Average Joe’ employee (Edward Norton) who grows tired of his mundane life. Approached by an enigmatic soap maker named Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt), he decides to co-create an underground ‘fight club’ wherein men can channel their aggression and frustration into fighting as a form of therapy.
Some say it is overrated, some say it is visionary; Fight Club depicts a world that is disturbingly raw and cruel to the point of grotesque. But at the same time it is funny and nasty; a clever metaphor to conformity and consumerism which has a potential to drive people insane. Some critics accused the film of being too “morally ambiguous” and violent but praised it’s acting and direction.
Even though it was made a reasonably disappointing gross at the box office ($100 million on a $63 million budget), Fight Club has made a phenomenal cultural impact and gained a passionate fanbase which has firmly established it as a cult classic.
Relive the twisted world of Chuck Palahniuk and David Fincher in the trailer below.
