'"Fight Club" and "A Streetcar Named Desire"

Although I may not have really liked alot of the readings we did in class, we did watch a lot of good movies.  I had watched both Fight Club and A Streetcar Named Desire before, but not in the same context that we did in this class.

In Streetcar, when I watched it in high school, we just watched it as a classic, not as a member of the gothic genre.  I did not pay attention to any of the effect and what they might mean.  Watching it in this class however made me pay much more attention.  I had never noticed Blanche's avoidance of light.  When I first saw this I thought it was just because she did not want people to see her real age.  She then refers to her first love as 'vivid light' and I realized that she avoids it to avoid reality.  Just like the other southern gothic stories we have read, Blanche cannot let go of the past, she cannot let go of her ex-husband.  If Blanche goes into the light, she is forced to accept that she is still alive while her ex-husband, the ray of light in her life, is dead.

I have seen "Fight Club" a full two times before, however not always in chronological order, or at the same time, so it has never really made sense to me.  I am really happy that I finally understand the plot of it!  I could see the theme of consumerism throught this movie.  Since I do not own the movie I had to Google it to find some examples of consumerism.  I found this quote that I remember, and really liked "I think there's a self-defense mechanism that keeps my generation from having any real honest connection or commitment with our true feelings. We're rooting for ball teams, but we're not getting in there to play. We're so concerned with failure and success—like these two things are all that's going to sum you up at the end".  The narrator says this.  I completly agree, people measure the level of their success based upon the material possessions they own.  I am caught between two worlds here however.  Being a Marketing major, consumerism is what will pay my bills.  We want people to get a feeling of satisfaction and success out of buying products, or they wouldn't spend nearly as much as they already do.  I do believe that money can't buy happiness, but it sure can rent a good time.