From Script To Screen: Analysing Fight Club

 Another film which I thought would help to trick the audience is Fight Club. Fight Club is one of my favourite films as it does this effect so well. I re-watched the film in order to get a fresh idea of what its about and to pay closer attention since I now knew what the twist would be.

Fight club is centred around the character Tyler Durden (known as The Narrator as he is never specifically named) and his desire to leave his endlessly boring life. The Narrator has extremely bad insomnia, meaning he spends most of his nights awake and lives his day like a zombie. He describes himself as feeling numb. To counter this he begins going to daily recovery circles for life threatening illnesses he doesn't have as he likes the feeling of being around other lost souls. This is where he meets the character Marla. The two go back and forth with The Narrator saying they cant both go to the support circles at the same time as they are both liar, so they decide to split days. 

As part of The Narrators job he has to go on a lot of business trips, with him meeting the second main character Tyler on the plane. The two exchange information such as their job where Tyler mentions he sells soap and then they go their separate ways. This is until The Narrators house is blown up due to a gas leak and out of desperation he calls Tyler from his business card. The two meet and form a friendship which ends in them fighting each other outside a bar due to them stating they've never been in a real fight. Tyler then offers his home to The Narrator which turns out to be an abandoned shack in the middle of nowhere. 

As the two men's relationship grows closer The Narrator begins to love Tyler's free way of life. They also continue to fight for fun, which leads to more men wanting to experience their carefree violence. This builds and builds throughout the film, which leads to Tyler being the owner of his own fight club. Tyler begins giving the men who turn up 'homework' assignments to complete to create mayhem around the city. The end goal is to shut down the system. Tyler becomes close with Marla after meeting her when she came to see The Narrator. As things begin to become more extreme with Tyler speaking about project mayhem, you can tell The Narrator is no longer comfortable with the situation. He loves the freedom which comes with fight club however wants nothing to do with the crimes which occur because of it. 

"And then one day Tyler Just vanished". This is how The Narrator describes it. Tyler just disappears. As an attempt to find where Tyler went The Narrator searches the house and find tickets to places around America. The Narrator goes to each place where he finds new fight clubs which have been established. However he does not find Tyler. Its at this point when The Narrator begins to lose it and in desperation asks Marla who she think he is. She responds by calling him Tyler Durden. There are then a series of flashbacks explaining this twist. Tyler says The Narrator was looking for a way to change his life. He couldn't do it on his own. So he created Tyler. A version of himself he longed to be. Tyler is handsome, charismatic, he knows what he wants and most importantly is free from the system. Everything The Narrator believes he is not. Sometimes The Narrator is himself, other times he imagines himself watching Tyler and sometime he is Tyler. The Narrator stays up at night and makes soap. He is also the one who has a sexual relationship with Marla. He established all the fight clubs while on business trips for his job and is the real culprit behind project mayhem. 

After coming to this realisation its now The Narrators job to stop his own plans. He finds out where project mayhem is taking place and goes to stop it. Once again he meets up with Tyler who is there to stop him. Tyler now appears with a shaven head and strange clothes to show his transition as just another member of the fight club. The two fight with shots from the security cameras showing The Narrator punching himself. Eventually The Narrator makes it to the top of the building where he comes to the realisation that Tyler is in his head and so he needs The Narrator in order to survive. The Narrator grabs the gun and shoots himself in the mouth. This is enough to break the illusion of Tyler, allowing him to get a solid grip back on reality. The film then ends here. 

I really like how at the beginning of the film you see flashes of Tyler in the narrators vision, hinting at his arrival. This shows The Narrator slowly drifting away from reality. I also think they explain the twist very well and give both visual and audible explanations of how it works. This is what takes it above other films which try to justify twist but leave you feeling dissatisfied as they don't fully explain how it works leaving plot holes in certain instances. I also like how the two characters truly feel different from one an other as you can feel The Narrators longing to be like Tyler. Finally I think by re-watching the film I was able to see certain shots and understand them doing it for the sake of showing Tyler and The Narrator as the same person. For example when Marla comes round The Narrator is talking to her and Tyler can be seen downstairs out of view from Marla. Tyler tells The Narrator what to say and then suddenly disappear. He then reappears once Marla leaves from a completely different location, hinting that he's not really there. I want to ensure once the twist happens in my story the audience understands and then can watch it back and understand all the hints that where there from the beginning.