10 Movies That Every Fight Club Fan Should See

In the minds of the majority of ’90s youth, David Fincher’s Fight Club is worth its weight in gold, with a lot of critics and fans revering it as a cult classic. Though this wasn’t always the case, as upon its release, Fight Club was viewed as a box-office disappointment commercially, and a film that tried too hard creatively.

Heavily loaded with themes of existentialism and capitalism, Fight Club paints a bleak picture of the toxicity that surrounds the American dream and the erosion of the male psyche that subscribes to it. Narrative layers and depth aside, Fincher’s film has an alluring visual appeal to it that works on dark tones and motion blurs, aided by a pulsating score by the Dust Brothers. While it’s a difficult task to find films that are directly similar to Fight Club, the following films do a good job of coming close to some independent aspects of Fight Club, reigniting the ’90s nostalgia left behind by Fincher’s film.

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10 Another Round (2020)

Thomas Vinterberg’s film provides a refreshing take on alcohol and the impact it has on humans by using four middle-aged men as its centerpiece. The four friends start off by ingesting alcohol as an experiment, but soon find the lines blurred between functionality and dysfunctionality when societal ties and responsibilities kick in.

A Closer Look Into Masculinity and Grief

Much like Fight Club, Another Rounduses men and masculinity and alcohol as a vehicle to confront matters of life and death. What starts out as a boozy affair slowly turns into a potent cocktail of hedonism and grief. Thomas Vinterberg’s film might differ from Fincher’s in terms of visual tones, but the themes surrounding masculinity and grief do converge at various points.

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9 Requiem for a Dream (2000)

Darren Aronofsky’s Requiem for a Dream is another cult classic on the list. A haunting portrait of the dangers of addictions of many kinds, Aronofsky’s film offers a closer look at addiction, addressing it in various shapes and sizes.

A Deep Dive Into Various Sorts of Addictions

Both films provide an insight into the subject of male mental health and society’s impact on its deterioration. While Fight Club is more layered and nuanced in its approach, Requiem for a Dream is an all-out sucker punch that doesn’t beat around the bush and drags the viewer down to the depths of addiction hell. The scene where Sara, an old lady (who’s addicted to weight-loss pills) starts hallucinating while watching herself on TV, is so horrifying and heartbreaking, that it’s bound to haunt the chambers of your memories.

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8 Gone Girl (2014)

Based on Gillian Flynn’s novel of the same name, Gone Girl is considered one Fincher’s best psychological thrillers. The plot follows a woman (Rosamund Pike) who disappears mysteriously on her fifth wedding anniversary, sending her husband’s world into a whirlpool of chaos and allegations.

A Moody Tale About Love Gone Cold

While Fight Club might be more alpha and masculine in its veneer, Gone Girl provides a different take on masculinity, capturing it in its most vulnerable and decaying state. Gone Girl is visually dark and moody, constantly twisting and turning in terms of the narrative, keeping the viewer hooked to their seats. The anxiety-inducing score from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross adds to the film’s moody charm, making Gone Girl essential Fincher viewing.

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7 American Psycho (2000)

American Psycho is another must-watch cult classic from the 2000s. Mary Harron’s film takes a dig at capitalism and the yuppie culture by exploring the life of a wealthy investment banker with a fragile ego and delusional psychopathic tendencies.

An Exploration of the Yuppie Culture and its Ill Effects on Society

Mary Harron’s feminine gaze objectively brings out the inherent male stupidity that’s fueled by competition and the effects of capitalism. While Fight Club is more sympathetic to the effects of capitalism on men by capturing their degradation, American Psycho uses comedy and satire to ridicule its subject, painting a portrait that’s dangerously scary and idiotic.

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6 Good Time (2017)

Directed by the promising duo, the Safdie Brothers, Good Time revolves around a failed bank robbery that sees developmentally-disabled Nick (Benny Safdie) get apprehended by the cops. Worried sick for him, his brother Connie (Robert Pattinson) embarks on a twisted odyssey through the dark underbelly of New York to get him out.

Dive Into the Criminal Underbelly of New York

Both Fight Club and Good Time are tonal cousins in that they’re visually cut from the same cloth. While Fight Club leans more on the side of existentialism and capitalism, Good Time is more dingy and boasts of strange happenings in the underworld. Where both films converge is in their common theme of mentally disturbed men who are the products of societal norms and their reactions to their surroundings.

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5 The Dark Knight (2008)

Many would argue that Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight is arguably one of the best Batman films to have ever been made. The film is treated with a raw and visceral reality that previous predecessors avoided, and pits the masked vigilante against one of his most formidable foes: the Joker.

Iconic Antiheroes

While The Dark Knight is mainly navigated by Batman’s (Christian Bale) moral compass, Fight Club is led by the strange machinations of Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt) and The Narrator (Edward Norton). Both films don’t approach reality through a rose-tinted lens, rather shining their spotlight on the dark underbelly of society and the twisted men that fester in it.

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4 Donnie Darko (2001)

Another early 2000s cult classic on the list, Donnie Darko is a dark film that revolves around a teenage boy of the same name (Jake Gyllenhaal), who narrowly escapes a bizarre accident and is plagued by visions of a rabbit that manipulates him into committing a series of crimes.

A Cult Classic That’s Still Relevant in Today’s Time

In terms of narrative similarity, both Fight Club and Donnie Darko have a strong element of a creepy and mysterious character that influences their subjects and convinces them to challenge their way of thinking. Donnie Darko matches Fincher’s film in terms of mood and tone, but slightly differs from Fight Club dealing with themes of surrealism and fantasy. That being said, Donnie Darko is an essential classic that has stood the test of time and is considered valuable entertainment.

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3 Joker (2019)

On paper, Joker tries to answer all the questions that Fight Club poses. The film charts the origin story of Batman’s arch nemesis and shines light on what transformed a mere clown, Arthur Fleck, into the Crown Prince of Gotham.

A Portrait of the Ill Effects of Capitalism on Masculinity

Despite the mounds of praise heaped on Joker, Todd Phillips’ portrait of a man’s descent into madness and his revenge on society doesn’t quite match up to Fincher’s analysis of capitalism and its effects on the male psyche. When viewed as a standalone film, Joker works well, and is reminiscent of a modern variant of Fight Club,with a similarity in visuals and tone but also enriched with narrative heritage and a mind-blowing performance by Joaquin Phoenix.

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2 Brazil (1985)

Terry Gilliam’s Brazil is a surreal and weird film to process. Much like Fight Club, but drenched in sci-fi and a surrealistic rendition of fantasy, the film takes place in a future world where a low-level clerk gets stuck in a web full of deceit and bureaucratic layers, as he’s framed for the murder of an innocent man.

A Dystopian Take on the Problems of Bureaucracy

Brazil matches up to the taste of Fight Club fans, who appreciate the psychological aspect of Fincher’s film. Gilliam’s film further indulges in the bizarre world of science fiction, taking it away from reality and giving it a feel of a tale of fantasy.

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1 Taxi Driver (1976)

Taxi Driver was one of the first few mainstream films that tackled the subject of the mental issues of masculinity head-on. Martin Scorsese’s iconic film saw Robert De Niro star as an ex-marine taxi driver named Travis, who is descending into madness, and fed up with where the world is going. During one of his night trips, he encounters an underage sex worker (Jodie Foster), and decides to help rid her from the evil clutches of her pimp.

Damaged Men That Are Products of a Damaged Society

Both Travis Bickle and Fight Club’s Narrator (Edward Norton) have a plethora of psychological issues that have been the result of years of social conditioning. While one man is a blue-collar worker, the other’s world is set in a corporate set-up that’s devoid of emotions and life. Initially viewed as a successful arthouse film, Scorsese’s classic also served as one of the pioneering films that laid the pavement blocks for dark character studies that revolved around the dangerous psyche of men.

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