Fight Club

It's not the year's best but "Fight Club" may be 1999's most unforgettable film.

So much of this dark, dark comedy — which, if you can imagine it, seems like a Hemingway novel reinterpreted by Ken Kesey — is up to the audience's perceptions that it's hard to know how to feel about it afterward.

For example, without giving too much away, the ending can be perceived as either a howlingly funny punchline to an extended joke or as a severe wimp-out. And, in retrospect, there are a pair of early scenes that don't make a whole lot of sense, given some later character developments.

That said, this wild 139-minute ride is exhilarating, if disturbing, throughout its first two-thirds — if you can remain seated long enough to appreciate its ironic humor and many plot twists and turns. But it really peters out in the final third, and, as mentioned, the conclusion will be debated hotly by the movie's admirers and detractors.

Also, it should be noted that despite the early squawking about its extremely violent and anarchic content, "Fight Club" can't really be considered a glorification — or for that matter, a justification — of violence. After all, the brutal consequences are shown — often in startlingly graphic detail (both visually and audibly).

But by the same token, it could be argued that "Fight Club" doesn't exactly discourage fistfighting and violent pranks, either. So those who take that side should just call it irresponsible filmmaking and leave it at that.

As for the film itself, its seemingly reluctant narrator is an unnamed recall investigator (Edward Norton), who, we're told, works for one of the major automakers. Seriously burned-out and suffering from insomnia, he is searching for some sort of relief to his humdrum existence.

He seems to find it, albeit briefly, when he becomes addicted to support groups, where he poses as a cancer survivor, among other things. However, his ruse is threatened by Marla Singer (Helena Bonham Carter), a fellow "tourist" whose presence at the support meetings disturbs him more than it probably should.

Fortunately, he quickly finds a new addiction when he hooks up with charming anarchist Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt), who manufactures his own soap and lives in a ramshackle abandoned house in the city's industrial district. After his apartment is destroyed, Norton's character moves in with Tyler and the two men start an underground "fight club," where men brawl to the point of unconsciousness, or worse.

But even the glow of that quickly fades, as the membership grows and as Tyler begins to recruit members to join him in a series of dangerous pranks and acts of vandalism throughout the city.