How Multiple Identities Were Portrayed in the Film Fight Club - Essay Example

Fight Club - how multiple identities were portrayed in the film Dissociative identity disorder is a mental illness in which a person assumes two personalities. In one instance, he may be forced to act like one person yet at another time forced to act like another person (Ringrose 142). This is caused by memory lapse or impairment that causes extraordinary forgetfulness to an individual. The disorder is normally not caused by such things as substance abuse, other medical conditions, or seizures as it occurs due to brain problems only. Dissociative identity disorder (D.I.D) is known to have no distinct symptoms. The symptoms vary over time according to different conditions (Ringrose 64). The movie, Fight Club, clearly shows how D.I.D can affect a person. This is as discussed below. Dissociative identity disorder normally tends to be exhibited by an individual during highly traumatizing, painful, and violent moments (Ringrose 123). This is fully exhibited in Fight Club when Jack fights to put off the bombs set by Tyler for the destruction of the credit card companies. The trauma at the scene transforms him into someone else such that he acquires two personalities while being in one body. He has exactly to know the side of the body where Tyler is hiding so that he can shoot him. He uses sense and conscience to determine the side Tyler is hiding and finally manages to shot him (Palahniuk 13). The main symptoms of the disorder are depression, sleep disorders like insomnia, and sleep walking. Mood signs, headache, panic attacks, and phobias can also be part of the first symptoms of the disorder. The disorder makes an individual perceive intrusive thoughts and emotions, which make the individual act in accordance with such emotions and thoughts (Ringrose 63). It also causes them to forget information and thus act as a blank personality driven by the implanted thoughts and no logic or reasoning. This is the most dangerous part of the disorder. It thus makes it necessary to take good care of such patients. The treatment of such a disorder is not yet fully defined but is mostly dependent on past case studies. The reaction a patient gives is the one that gives the doctor a clue about the required action to be taken. A patient is handled according to how a previous patient was handled (Ringrose 78). It is thus important to notice any early symptoms for the treatment to be easier. Complicated cases can be difficult to handle. Considering Fight Club as a movie, identity is used as a style. Identity is used to show how the character of Jack, the narrator of the movie has the same personality with Tyler. This is well exhibited at the end of the movie when Jack has to shoot through his cheek so that he can hurt Tyler (Palahniuk 23). It clearly shows how Jack and Tyler have merged into one person and are operating using the same body and characteristics. Identity is also exhibited at places when people are referring to Jack as Tyler. This was mainly when Jack was following the trail of places where Tyler used to do the preparation for destruction of the credit card companies. All the people he met during the trip referred to him as Tyler. Marla also is seen to refer to Jack as Tyler. She even gets confused and ends up having an affair with both of them. This shows that most probably the two personalities having have merged into one body are inseparable and unidentifiable (Palahniuk 16). Fight Club as a movie exhibits a number of film techniques. Suspense as a technique is used in the movie at the place when the narrator is not given a name at the start of the movie. In this case, the viewer does not fully understand the position of the narrator. Finally, it comes out that he is the main character and suffers from failure of identity (Ringrose 92). This again brings up another film technique of symbolism. The disorder affecting the narrator that leads to lack of identity makes the narrator not be given a name. Suspense is created at the place when the crowds gathering for the fights fail to identify Jack and Tyler. They start referring to Jack as Tyler at most of the places. Symbolism as a film technique is also used at the place when Jack and Tyler fight at the club. The fight might have symbolized the differences they had, which would lead to Jack killing Tyler at the end of the movie (Palahniuk 53). Foreshadows in the film have also been used extensively. The first scene is seen when the film starts at a point when Jack is holding his gun inside Tyler’s mouth. The same scene is repeated at the end of the movie when Jack saves the credit card companies from being burnt down by the explosives created by Tyler and his team (Palahniuk 152). It is foreshadowed that, at the end of the film, the two friends will have differences that might lead to death of one of them. The fact that the film did not give the name of the narrator at the start of the film may have foreshadowed that the narrator may have identity issues. Dissociative identity disorder is depicted in the film and presents mysteries that need deep analysis to understand. The first mystery is created when Jack is on errands looking for Tyler’s visits (Sachs and Graeme 23). When travelling, people tend to know Jack, as they call him Tyler. This shows that really they were two personalities operating in one body. It is a mystery for two different personalities to be using one body. Another point is seen when Marla is seen to be confused; she has sex with both Jack and Tyler. A time reaches when she refers to Jack as Tyler. Jack gets confused about the situation and even calls Marla to ask if it is true that they had an affair. At the same point, Tyler appears and confirms to them that he and Jack are the same person and that he is only a mental project of jack. Another mystery yet happens at the end of the movie when Jack realizes that, both he and Tyler form the same person, meaning that Tyler cannot be the one holding the gun. He then blows the gun through his cheek in order to kill Tyler (Palahniuk 99). This is a mystery since Jack has to get a hole through his cheeks in order to kill Tyler, who happens to be a different person, but his body is merged into Jack’s body. In this film, Jack is suffering from insomnia. He cannot get any sleep, and this forces him to get a doctor who only advices him to join a meeting for those recovering from testicular cancer (Sachs and Graeme 145). The meeting helps him to cry so that he can sleep. The insomnia being one of the signs of dissociative identity disorder is the main cause of his disorder. This disorder may be the real reason that the Fight Club was started. This can be seen at the time when they started a fight with Tyler, which ended up being the real project for the opening of the Fight Club (Sachs and Graeme, 19). It is hard to determine if the individual fighting at the time is Jack or a bodily representation of another person. The Fight Club was created with a death wish attitude. This is evident from the way the people fight each other carelessly at the club without care. This is an early sign in the movie that finally a person will have to die in the movie. During the preparation for the casting for the movie, Fight Club, there were consultations as to which actors to include in the cast. The position of the narrator was to be acted by Sean Penn but was not initially taken as Edward Norton was taken. The place of Tyler was to be done by Russell Crowe but was later performed by Brad Pitt. The two were picked because of their successes in their previous movies, and the directors of Fight Club had high prospects for the movie and needed good performance from the acting crew. These actors were to be identified and convinced before accepting to act in the movie. At the time, Norton was preparing to act another movie, but they had to promise an increase in pay before he accepted the performance. This shows how much faith and need they had for him. It shows that the actors were selected keenly to bring out the themes and specific messages in the movie (Sachs and Graeme 12). In conclusion, dissociation identity disorder is a deadly disorder and can lead to one indulging in deadly things that he does not intent to do (Ringrose 12). Someone with such a disorder needs to be attended to by being secluded in a private place then the necessary action taken by the one in charge. This will help reduce any damage that the patient might cause when he changes into another person’s body form. In the movie, the doctor consulted by Jack fails to advise him accordingly, and this might be the start of the problems as exhibited in the movie. The doctor was supposed to examine him and ascertain any possibilities of him contracting a more dangerous disorder such as dissolution identity disorder. In the recent times, the disorder has become very common and thus this calls for doctors to be on the watch out for any patient with the symptoms and help him accordingly. Parents and society are also supposed to be out to help if any symptoms are noted in an individual. This will help reduce crime cases in the society. Works Cited Eilperin, Juliet. Fight Club politics : how partisanship is poisoning the House of Representatives. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. Print. Palahniuk, Chuck. Fight Club. London: Vintage, 2006. Print. Ringrose, Jo. Understanding and treating dissociative identity disorder (or multiple personality disorder). London : Karnac Books, 2012. Print. Sachs, Adah. & Graeme, Galton. Forensic aspects of dissociative identity disorder. London : Karnac Books, 2008. Print. Read More

 

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