Amazeballs

By daring to write a review of Fight Club, I’ve already broken the first and second rules—and let me say, it’s a palpable thrill. The aura of sacred secrecy is less a taboo than a dare, and David Fincher’s film, like Chuck Palahniuk’s novel before it, delights in goading you to break taboos and then wallow in the delicious guilt of being caught. Few book-to-screen projects have such a brawl in the ring between source material and adaptation—usually it’s a TKO for mediocrity. But here, Fincher doesn’t just survive the pummeling; he jabs, feints, and emerges with his bruises gleaming.

There are movies that claim to “go there,” and then there’s 8mm—a movie that finds the locked door, kicks it open, and drags you into a darkness so absolute you forget the way out. Joel Schumacher, who usually deals in gloss and glitter, here trades the neon for bruise-purples and cigarette-ash shadows. The result? A drama that should come with a warning label: THERE’S NO SUCH THING AS ‘JUST LOOKING’ ANYMORE.