Essay on Fight Club and Our Consumer Identity - 1405 Words

Fight Club and Our Consumer Identity The narrator in the film Fight Club is questioned about his devastated condo and declares, That condo was my life, okay? I loved every stick of furniture in that place. That was not just a bunch of stuff that got destroyed, that was me! This attitude of defining self-identity through a consumer culture has become institutionalized in the American society. The film Fight Club addresses the excessive consumerism as a sign of emotional emptiness and as a form of self-distinction. While the title suggests that it is just another clichà © action movie, it is not so shallow or narrowly focused. It instead provides the viewer with a provocative view on American society and it raises valid questions about†¦show more content†¦Together, they end up creating the underground fight club that becomes wildly popular with blue-collar workers. Shirt-less men beat each other into bloody messes every Saturday night in the basement of a bar. As the movie progresses, this underground club beco mes more of a renegade resistance group that causes mayhem to corporate America. While Tyler is leading his cult to more mischief and mayhem, Jack thinks it has gotten out of hand. Fight club has spread across the country and Tyler’s next mission is to blow up all the major credit companies to erase everyone’s credit thus leveling the economic playing field. Jack, in an attempt to stop him, chases Tyler around the country but it always appears that he has just missed Tyler. Jack slowly comes to the conclusion that he himself and Tyler are the same person. While Jack thought he was sleeping, in reality his schizophrenic other half was working Tyler’s jobs, making soap and trying to blow Americas materialistic views to pieces. Jack is able to destroy his alter ego by over coming Tyler’s influence and shooting himself through the cheek; however, he is not able to stop Tyler’s explosions. The last scene shows the buildings collapsing while Jack and Mar la are kissing. Fight Club challenges the typical American consumer identity by creating two contradicting characters. Jack starts out as a consumer defining his life by possessions, while Tyler lives his life on his own terms. One of the betterShow MoreRelatedBelonging1049 Words   |  5 PagesBelonging can be a possible path to an individual’s self-actualisation. A sense of identity can be identified by belonging or not belonging to a particular group or place. A person can portray different values of belonging through different situations and settings, like in Shakespeare’s period and the period in ‘Fight Club’. Maslow’s Hierarchy of belonging suggests that belonging is one of the basic needs of human existence. All humans aspire to belong but only a few are able to transcend this basicRead MoreEssay on Criticisms of Consumerism and Materialism in Fight Club1134 Words   |  5 Pagesessential to our survival? No. Were consumers. Were by-products of a lifestyle obsession. Murder, crime, poverty...these things dont concern me. What concerns me is celebrity magazines, television with five hundred channels, some guys name on my underwear†(29 min.) We are a generation comprised of invidious and conspicuous consumers, desperately trying to meet society’s consumerist criteria; seeking the false promise of the American dream. This is the reality presented in Fincher’s Fight Club (1999)Read MoreFight Club By Chuck Palahniuk1138 Words   |  5 Pagesbehaviors, feelings, and lives. The psychological novel, Fight Club, by Chuck Palahniuk, uses a man’s need for a male role of identity to fit in into society as a way of showing how consumerism can be threatening a man’s identity and masculinity. Palahniuk explores the life of a man who in an attempt to break free of a capitalist society forms a clandestine â€Å"fight club† as a form of rebellion towards society. 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Fight club is about a man fighting battlesRead MoreTextual Analysis Essay on Fight Club1250 Words   |  5 PagesAnalysis Essay The classic 1996 film Fight Club is a social commentary about our generation, which is in many ways devoid of spirit and marked by consumerism. It is the story of a mans spiritual journey towards enlightenment in modern society and his attempt to find his place in the world. It stresses a post-modern consumer society, reveals the loss of masculine identity amongst gray-collar workers, and examines the social stratification marked by our developing society. It follows the life of