On Roger Ebert supposedly "missing the point" of Fight Club

It seems like whenever Roger Ebert's negative review of this movie comes up, people like to whine about him "missing the point". e.g. "Roger doesn't understand that Fight Club was a message against Tyler's philosophy"

Well if you actually read his review then you'll discover that's not the case.

In his review of Fight Club he states:

"Of course, "Fight Club" itself does not advocate Durden's philosophy. It is a warning against it, I guess; one critic I like says it makes "a telling point about the bestial nature of man and what can happen when the numbing effects of day-to-day drudgery cause people to go a little crazy"

What he also has to say is this:

"Although sophisticates will be able to rationalize the movie as an argument against the behavior it shows, my guess is that audience will like the behavior but not the argument. Certainly they'll buy tickets because they can see Pitt and Norton pounding on each other; a lot more people will leave this movie and get in fights than will leave it discussing Tyler Durden's moral philosophy. The images in movies like this argue for themselves, and it takes a lot of narration (or Narration) to argue against them"

I mean, you can't say he doesn't make a good point. What about all the copycat fight clubs that were started in the film's aftermath? And even to this day I personally have spoken to people online who've completely misinterpreted the film's message. Roger was also correct that the film's violence is cartoonish.

I may not personally agree with Roger's negative review of the movie, but I can understand his views. Let's not accuse him of "missing the point". It's the same with his review of Starship Troopers, where people think he didn't understand it was satire, even though he makes that point in his review.

Submitted October 18, 2017 at 04:06PM by PeterParkerPizzaTime http://ift.tt/2ywAsDg