The Movie
The subject of modern manhood is a fascinating one, to me at least, and no film has ever explored it with the anarchic fervor of Fight Club. What does it mean to be a man in a high-end-consumerist world of designer sheets and skinny lattes? And how can we regain our lost masculinity? Corporate drone, The Narrator a.k.a. Jack (Edward Norton) meets his mentor in the charismatic Tyler Durden (a gleeful Brad Pitt), an inspirational guy's guy who is everything Jack is not.
Central to Tyler's world view is a burgeoning hobby called Fight Club, an underground celebration of fisticuffs that encourages total strangers to duke it out, and a little hands-on violence soon reawakens a generation of men raised by women. And then the club evolves into something even more dangerous, leading Jack to a shocking discovery about his new best friend. The graphically anti-social behavior is executed with the sort of intelligent thrill that only a contemporary master like David Fincher could conjure, resulting in a rousing evening of delicious cinema.
The Picture
The AVC presentation beautifully captures the single-frame edits of an approaching Tyler Durden (that's one of Durden's favorite tricks) within a slightly grainy but otherwise very clean 2.4:1 frame. The distinctive colors are often ugly, in a lovely way, and blacks are definitely credible even if I wish they offered more detail: Fincher no doubt craved serious darks. There's a little noise in some of the filthy background bricks of Jack and Tyler's house, but in general the image is sharp and free from unwanted distractions.
The Sound
Fight Club needs to be watched good and loud, as it is best enjoyed as a full-on assault to the senses. It's a story about shaking up the status quo, and so the DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack packs very aggressive surrounds and plenty of bass: no way we're nodding off during this one. The absurdity of modern life is shrewdly conveyed via conspicuous environmental audio, from the clutter of fancy home/office trappings to the abundant presence of sirens. Rain is also unusually big and slappy, and my God, the midair collision of Jack's jumbo jet hits like a swift kick.
The Extras
Four exceptional audio commentaries are carried over from the award-winning DVD edition. Director David Fincher flies solo on one track, with another from Fincher joined by stars Brad Pitt, Edward Norton and Helena Bonham Carter. On another, writer meets writer as author Chuck Palahniuk shares the mic with screenwriter Jim Uhls, and a fourth track Pulls together production designer Alex McDowell, cinematographer Jeff Cronenweth, costume designer Michael Kaplan and visual effects supervisor Kevin Haug.
Also preserved is the vast "Behind the Scenes" section, an elaborate interactive concoction that allows us to look at/listen to the making of the movie from multiple angles and with alternate audio, including further commentary, in the sub-categories of Production, Visual Effects and On Location. Some of the seven deleted and alternate scenes provide secondary angles and brief, interesting text intros that call out the more subtle differences. This disc also has a deeper Publicity Material section than most, plus an Art Gallery. All of the above is in standard definition.
New for Blu-ray is "A Hit in the Ear: Ren Klyce and the Sound Design of Fight Club." This interactive feature analyzes and lets us remix four key sequences with both "expressionistic" and "naturalistic" audio, "Real World" or "Jack's POV" mixes with onscreen master volume control plus the ability to isolate and adjust any of the five channels, on the fly. Simply amazing. "Flogging Fight Club" is a crazy ten-minute bit wherein David, Brad and Edward accept an award from Spike TV earlier this year, in HD. And the Insomniac Mode: I Am Jack's Search Index allows us to jump directly to any themed point in the movie, or what-all is being discussed on any of the four commentary channels, and beyond. Like I said: Amazing.
Final Thoughts
Is Fight Club's keen exploitation of current home theater technology another one of the movie's unforgiving satires, mocking us consumers for our slavish embrace of bi-pole/di-pole surrounds and downward-firing subwoofers? More to the point, what would Tyler Durden say about Blu-ray? Durden be damned. I say, "buy it!"
Product Details
- Actors: Edward Norton, Brad Pitt, Helena Bonham Carter, Meat Loaf, Zach Grenier, Richard Chesler, Jared Leto, Rachel Singer, David Lee Smith
- Director: David Fincher
- Audio Format/Languages: 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio (English), DTS 5.1 (French), Dolby Digital 5.1 (French, Spanish, Portuguese), Dolby Digital 2.0 (English)
- Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Danish, Finnish, Dutch, Norwegian, Swedish, Chinese, Mandarin; all four audio commentaries are also subtitled in various languages
- Aspect Ratio: 2.40:1
- Number of discs: 1
- Rating: R
- Studio: Fox
- Release Date: November 17, 2009
- Run Time: 139 minutes
- List Price: $34.99
- Extras:
- Audio commentary by director David Fincher
- Audio commentary by Fincher, Brad Pitt, Edward Norton and Helena Bonham Carter
- Audio commentary by Chuck Palahniuk and Jim Uhls
- Audio commentary by Alex McDowell, Jeff Cronenweth, Michael Kaplan and Kevin Haug
- "A Hit in the Ear: Ren Klyce and the Sound Design of Fight Club"
- "Flogging Fight Club"
- Behind the Scenes
- Production
- Visual Effects
- On Location
- Deleted and Alternate Scenes
- Publicity Material
- Art Gallery
