Beginnings and endings, as well as time, are treated with very specific outlooks in both the film and novel versions of Fight Club. In Chuck Palahniuk's novel and David Fincher's film alike, the narrative seems to wash over us as though in a dream. While Palahniuk uses chapter breaks and page breaks to denote the passage of time, Fincher has an incredible command of the art of montage, showing in a flash what Palahniuk offers in several wry sentences. The beginning of both stories is the same - "Tyler" holding a gun in the narrator's mouth. In both works, this climax actually bookends the story. However, the film's treatment of the flashback is treated with a bit more direct humor: while the narrator, in the beginning, says "I can't think of anything" around the barrel of the gun, when the characters arrive at that point in the story again he says "I still can't think of anything." Tyler, being in on the joke of the passage of time, mutters, "Ah, flashback humor."
The ending of both works, unlike the beginning, is dramatically different. In the film, the narrator shoots himself through the cheek, "killing" Tyler Durden; with Marla, he sees the buildings blow up as a new era starts for mankind. In the book, however, it isn't until after he is reunited with Marla Singer that he realizes the bombs are not going to go off, and he shoots himself in the head. The fact that the buildings blow up in the film says something wildly different about the main story. While the book's narrator is locked up in a mental institution, only to see/fantasize about all the men around him who are in on Project Mayhem, the film's story is complete; civilization has crumbled, and the narrator no longer cares. The final shot of the film is of the narrator and Marla joining hands as skyscrapers blow up around them, synchronizing the collapse of civilization and the start of the narrator's life.
