Calvin Cullen
Stunt Coordinator
- Joined
- Feb 25, 2001
- Messages
- 84
I just saw Cast Away, and was struck by some bizarre similarites with Fincher's Fight Club. Superficially, both films feature:
1. A plane crash: One real, one imagined
2. Imaginary friends: Tyler and Wilson
3. Really awesome Fox special edition DVDs
At the beginning of Cast Away, Chuck is a slave to his job. His chain is the clock, his shackles are cell phones and pagers. His career leads him to berate his subordinates, neglect the woman who loves him and even steal a bike from an innocent child. He cannot relate to the emotional turmoil of his best friend (who's wife is dying of cancer). He is not a human, merely a robot -- devoid of free will and blindly following the American Dream. He goes where his company tells him, when they tell him. He abandons his new fiancee during perhaps the most meaningful moment of both their lives. HE SHOULD HAVE NEVER GOT ON THAT AIRPLANE. (Or should he?)
After his little ordeal on the island, he returns to Memphis. The world has changed and so has he. But his change involves more than football teams and SUVs. He is now a full-fledged Human Being, with the ability to break away from the path society has chosen for him. His former lover has "moved on" with her life -- thanks to the advice of her friends. She is married to a man she obviously does not love, and they have a child. She has abandoned her intellectual career pursuits to become the June Cleaver of the 1990s. Despite the pain she must have felt when she thought Chuck was dead, she is still stuck doing what SOCIETY EXPECTS OF HER -- rather than pursuing her own dreams in any meaningful way. This is why she cannot abandon her husband for Chuck, the man she has never stopped loving.
Chuck feels no such obligation to the demands of society. The Fed-Ex package was his last link to the person he was. He ends the film at a crossroads, free (as a bird) to pursue any path he wishes.
The thematic parallels to Fight Club should now be obvious - You are not your job, etc. In the end, Ed Norton is free to be himself. He also gets the girl -- a conceit of the young. At the end of Cast Away, Chuck gets any girl he wants -- clearly a conceit of the middle-aged. Zemeckis really dropped the ball on this one, but the subversive elements of the screenplay are still there for anyone willing to look.
[Edited last by Calvin Cullen on September 03, 2001 at 06:01 PM]
1. A plane crash: One real, one imagined
2. Imaginary friends: Tyler and Wilson
3. Really awesome Fox special edition DVDs
At the beginning of Cast Away, Chuck is a slave to his job. His chain is the clock, his shackles are cell phones and pagers. His career leads him to berate his subordinates, neglect the woman who loves him and even steal a bike from an innocent child. He cannot relate to the emotional turmoil of his best friend (who's wife is dying of cancer). He is not a human, merely a robot -- devoid of free will and blindly following the American Dream. He goes where his company tells him, when they tell him. He abandons his new fiancee during perhaps the most meaningful moment of both their lives. HE SHOULD HAVE NEVER GOT ON THAT AIRPLANE. (Or should he?)
After his little ordeal on the island, he returns to Memphis. The world has changed and so has he. But his change involves more than football teams and SUVs. He is now a full-fledged Human Being, with the ability to break away from the path society has chosen for him. His former lover has "moved on" with her life -- thanks to the advice of her friends. She is married to a man she obviously does not love, and they have a child. She has abandoned her intellectual career pursuits to become the June Cleaver of the 1990s. Despite the pain she must have felt when she thought Chuck was dead, she is still stuck doing what SOCIETY EXPECTS OF HER -- rather than pursuing her own dreams in any meaningful way. This is why she cannot abandon her husband for Chuck, the man she has never stopped loving.
Chuck feels no such obligation to the demands of society. The Fed-Ex package was his last link to the person he was. He ends the film at a crossroads, free (as a bird) to pursue any path he wishes.
The thematic parallels to Fight Club should now be obvious - You are not your job, etc. In the end, Ed Norton is free to be himself. He also gets the girl -- a conceit of the young. At the end of Cast Away, Chuck gets any girl he wants -- clearly a conceit of the middle-aged. Zemeckis really dropped the ball on this one, but the subversive elements of the screenplay are still there for anyone willing to look.
[Edited last by Calvin Cullen on September 03, 2001 at 06:01 PM]
