Fight Club the 1999 Feature Movie, Fight

Fight Club

The 1999 feature movie, Fight Club, directed by David Fincher and starring Brad Pitt and Edward Norton seemed as if the entire film was dedicated to the phenomenon of antisocial behavior. This exploration into the mind of an apparently normal man demonstrated the significance and the trials of an individual dealing with the pressures of society. The purpose of this essay is to explain antisocial behavior as it is represented within this movie. Specifically, I will describe the climactic last scene of the movie as the culmination of this social psychological phenomenon which entails rebelling against society and finding one's own individual voice.

This story centers around an anonymous individual, who, through a series of strange and dreamlike events, becomes "associated" with a more rebellious and inspiring character named Tyler. Throughout the movie, Tyler and the narrator become closer and begin to share in an unique hobby of fighting one another, and their friends, in a secret fight club. As the story continues to build, fight club is the centerpiece around a more rebellious and large-scale revolutionary mindset. Tyler leads the narrator into more daring and risky situations. Ultimately Tyler's dream of destroying the financial industries using explosives culminates in the scene of interests.

In this last scene of the movie, the narrator realizes that he is actually a split personality of Tyler and all of their actions together were nothing more than his imagination. This occurs only after the narrator attempts to kill himself and blow off his head. He only harms himself yet Tyler is killed by a suicide-homicide psychological twist. The narrator is not mortally wounded and lives as the explosives burn through the targeted enemy buildings. In this final scene, it is clearly evident that the pressures of society can lead to extremely dangerous behavior and antisocial tendencies that tend to snowball and contribute to even greater dangers and more similar type behavior.

Antisocial behavior presents a unique challenge to those wishing to understand how society works on a large scale. Nauert (2010) in a recent discovery, understood that the issue is genetic and environmental, "scientists discovered children with one variation of a serotonin transporter gene are more likely to exhibit psychopathic traits if they also grow up poor." While it is unknown what exactly in the brain would cause antisocial behavior most would agree that it's some combination of environment and genetic. To what extent will most likely remain a mystery however and preventing such behavior seems to be more important task in my humble opinion.

Antisocial behavior involves individuals reacting negatively towards societies principles. Often violent and disruptive behavior reveals itself in such a disorder. Many pressures of society that arise from the incredible and wide reaching influence of mass media coupled with the intense pressures inherent in American life where success and failure mean everything. Environmental factors play a large role in this phenomenon as well and should not be underestimated . According to the American Psychiatric Association, antisocial behavior symptoms include failure to conform to social norms, deceitfulness, impulsivity or failure to plan ahead, reckless disregard for safety of self and others and lack of remorse.

In some ways Tyler and his partners behavior demonstrated this antisocial tendency and in other ways they do not. The final scene is a culmination of a gradual shift towards an exaggerated or radical stance wishing by contrast the seemingly different mindsets between society. But at what point does one create their own society with its own? Depending on where your society is everyone is antisocial at some point in their lives? I believe is the ultimate point of the final scene in which the character is completing his cycle of life. It is necessary for the narrator to kill himself in order for him to be born-again. To me, this signifies there is no escape from the pressures of society and dealing with them in your own way may be the only applicable treatment for such a uncomfortable problem. Excepting problems and dealing with them in healthy and cathartic method seem to be a much less painful way of dealing with these problems.

Antisocial behavior, in some ways, becomes the generating force of new ideas. This final scene, while concluding one chapter of the narrator's life, introduces a new way of living with his recently discovered freedom. The narrator and Tyler's behavior throughout the movie may seem antisocial in some ways yet they appear to be very disciplined and rigid in other ways. Initiation into the fight club requires extreme discipline and accordance to strict law. In today's society typically laws are disregarded and thrown aside because of the difficulty of obeying them all of the time. In some instances the fight club represents an enlightened elite society.

The movie and this scene contained many ideas resulting to social psychological phenomena. Personal perceptions toward society are explicitly laid out in the narrators first-person narration as the fight club continues to grow, group think and group dynamics begin to influence social ideas of this new conglomeration. The aggression and method of relieving and expressing individual fear also represents a relationship to the phenomenon. These principles need to be understood in a way that can be explained to society as a whole. This movie, and this scene in particular, provide many learning opportunities and should be explored to fully realize its contribution towards understanding these social psychological phenomenon.