Fight Club (movie and book) considered Discordian?

[Epimetheus]

Yeah, FYI geekdad, I've only seen the movie.

[Placid Dingo]

Agree about the book.

Also, I think it has a different tone, generally.

[Thurnez Isa]

I'm going to also say that the book has a completely different and, in my opinion, much better ending with a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT POINT.

missing the point is a tradition in film making

[geekdad]

Author Chuck Palahniuk has stated that he found the film to be an improvement on his novel.

For whatever that's worth.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Author Chuck Palahniuk has stated that he found the film to be an improvement on his novel.

For whatever that's worth.

It's pretty irrelevant, actually.

[Faust]

most of it seemed like some newly "liberated" escapism, a pinch of discordian themes sprinkled in, and a few quotes that get paraded around here ad nausium (unique snowflake speech I'm looking at you).

Also whoever said Inception has me puzzled, It seemed to have a minimum in plot and was just a big summer eyecandy.

[Placid Dingo]

most of it seemed like some newly "liberated" escapism, a pinch of discordian themes sprinkled in, and a few quotes that get paraded around here ad nausium (unique snowflake speech I'm looking at you).

Also whoever said Inception has me puzzled, It seemed to have a minimum in plot and was just a big summer eyecandy.

Depending on how much your personal brand of discordia is into memes, spreading ideas etc. I watched it whiled I was still very into Art of Memetics, and it seemed to play off a lot of those concepts. Simplifying an idea so it can spread, being aware of the potential consquences of your message, etc.

But yeah, I'm certainly not saying it was the most intellectual film ever made.

[Golden Applesauce]

Only similarity I see is thinking differently from the norm, and being anti-norm.

It's only "anti-norm" in the most asinine way possible - by playing exactly into the norm's idea of what the anti-norm should be.  Society styles itself as the only thing standing between us and barbarism, that acting against its norms brings us one step closer to Somalia-style anarchism.  Fight Club (the movie, anyway, haven't read the book) accepts this paradigm - they reject society through explosives, which is exactly what The Machine wants you to think is the only way to reject society.

Tyler Durden plays the same game as the (imagined?) corporatist power brokers, just on the opposite side.

Discordians (REALLY REAL ONES) play whatever game they please.  No need to try to beat dehumanizing FUD organizations at their own game.

[Cramulus]

The movie and the book have similar endings, though they arrive at it from very different angles.

SPOLER ALERT SPOLER ALERT SPOLER ALERT SPOLER ALERT SPOLER ALERT SPOLER ALERT SPOLER ALERT





The Narrator moves through two extremes throughout the plot. In the beginning, he lives a very anesthetic, inauthentic life. He creates a fictional, idealized version of himself which is 100% authentic, living in the physical, take no prisoners bad ass, Tyler. Tyler draws the narrator away from his life and pushes him towards this lifestyle which is centered entirely on experience.

Throughout this conflict, the narrator builds up this jealousy of Tyler, which we can read as a disconnection between his real self and idealized self, a chasm he cannot cross. In the movie, he resolves this tension by killing the ideal and falling in love with Marla. In the book, he resolves this tension by going crazy and gets institutionalized. (right? It's been a few years since I've read the book)

I thought the movie was a really great adaptation of the book, it captured the tone really well. But I think one of the major themes in the book that didn't make it to the screen is a theme of Sacrifice. In the book, Tyler puts more emphasis on the connection between Soap and Urine and Sacrifice. And to me, that means that we should read Tyler's drive to destroy everything as a drive to SACRIFICE the world of appearances and inauthenticity, and trade it for the idealized life of authentic experience, no matter what the cost.

To me, the narrative never comes out in favor of Tyler, it glamorizes him, but it never shows him as a hero. When the narrator is jealous of Tyler, he's not realyl interested in destroying financial institutions - he's jealous of Tyler's coolness, the power he wields, the uninhibited way that he acts. It's a far cry from the ikea apartment with a fridge full of condiments but no food.

The way I read it, it shows that there needs to be some compromise between the everyday self who lives in the world of horrible jobs, and the ideal self who drives, fucks, and smokes like a character from an action movie. In the end, the narrator cannot build his new life by sacrificing everything, he has to invest himself in the world, he has to fall in love with Marla, not blow her up.


At least, that's what I got from it.

The Parable of the Gong is sort of about this idea too.

[the last yatto]

I'm not seeing it. What about it seemed Discordian to you?

Revolution sponsored by Pepsi?