I think you may be missing part of the point of the film. It's not a celebration of masculinity and misogyny; it's a condemnation. The out-of-control testosterone that Tyler embodies is shown to be ultimately not just destructive, but self destructive as well. Men so deeply involved in Tyler's super-macho "Project Mayhem" lose any semblance of not only of belonging to society, they lose their own identity as well (every man who dies in service of Project Mayhem receives the same ceremony -- "His name was Phillip Bowman" (or whatever that first dead man's name was), regardless of what their name really was). The narrator only begins to understand that his misanthropic fantasies are spiraling out of control when they begin to impact Marla -- who, I suggest, represents not women, but Ed Norton's character's only contact with the world outside of the self-consuming fantasy that he's created for himself.
The movie itself understands the narrator's delusion throughout the whole progress of the film, and condemns it solidly. As the delusion builds and builds, the narrator is thrust deeper and deeper inside of himself and further away from society; he loses his apartment, he creates a working situation where he is unanswerable to anyone, and so on. It's only at the end when he allows himself to connect with Marla that he can be pulled out of the illusion and the destruction; and then only at the cost of likely self inflicted brain damage.
The film shouldn't be seen as a celebration or even endorsement of Tyler's statement; rather, it should be seen as an outright condemnation of it.
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momijizukamori
no subject
Date: 2006-11-15 08:35 pm (UTC)The movie itself understands the narrator's delusion throughout the whole progress of the film, and condemns it solidly. As the delusion builds and builds, the narrator is thrust deeper and deeper inside of himself and further away from society; he loses his apartment, he creates a working situation where he is unanswerable to anyone, and so on. It's only at the end when he allows himself to connect with Marla that he can be pulled out of the illusion and the destruction; and then only at the cost of likely self inflicted brain damage.
The film shouldn't be seen as a celebration or even endorsement of Tyler's statement; rather, it should be seen as an outright condemnation of it.