Hooray for Hollywood

It is amazing how many movies have started with the same basic premise as Fight Club. You start with a man who is bored with his life, and you can go anywhere from there. In the case of Fight Club, the Narrator’s life starts to spiral out of control. The first (and one of my favorite movies) that comes to my mind is the Thomas Crown Affair. Whether it be the original or the remake (the remake is definitely better) they both focus on Thomas Crown an eccentric millionaire who gets bored being the best. So he does what any normal bored man does, and steals a priceless painting from a museum. The other thing in this movie that is similar is that his plans get sidetracked by a female character he falls for. Another movie would be the Gumball Rally. An entire movie about numerous characters who race cross country every year because they are all bored. One thing that is similar in this movie is that it is an organization that causes hijinks just like Project Mayhem. One recent movie that has a similar premise is Central Intelligence with Kevin Hart and Dwayne Johnson. Kevin Hart’s character is someone who is unhappy with their life and wants a change. Dwayne Johnson’s character is reminiscent of Tyler because he kind of provokes their counterpart into doing their acts of mayhem. My last example is the new Magnificent Seven. The interesting thing about this example is that it is not the main character who is bored. It is Chris Pratt’s character. His character thrives on mayhem throughout the entire film because he simply does not have anything to do besides play cards and drink. There are numerous points in the film where he creates mayhem like when he provokes any of the other members of the Seven or throws off the enemy army with his sacrifice. I think that Hollywood has definitely capitalized on our boredom and created characters which we can empathize with.