Overall Rating
  Awesome: 37.55%
Worth A Look: 30.11%
Average: 14.13%
Pretty Bad: 11.52%
Total Crap: 6.69%
12 reviews, 197 user ratings
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| American Psycho |
by Erik Childress
"Challenging, Funny, Controversial and Destined for Cult Classic Status"
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Nobody knows who Patrick Bateman is – not even Patrick Bateman. For those who didn’t read it, Patrick Bateman is the anti-hero of Bret Easton Ellis’ controversial 1992 novel about a serial killer in the late 80s. He’s the personification of the 80s attitude of “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” – no matter at what cost. Living in the world of Wall Street with the meticulously clean apartment, the perfect clothes and the nightlife lifestyle of clubs, restaurants and hookers, Bateman fills the empty void of feeling in his life by killing as many people as possible.Set in 1987, Bateman’s life consists of a rigorous daily grooming and exercise routine. He goes to work and makes his money by apparently doing nothing but watching TV and listening to soothing pop ballads. Nighttime is dedicated to numerous social engagements and the opportunity to get into the latest clubs and restaurants. Problem is, the more he tries to fit in amongst his inner circle, the more faceless he becomes. His only sense of identity comes in his business card and is incensed (in a very funny scene) when he realizes one of his co-workers has a better looking piece of paper. Bateman’s taste in music resides primarily in two of the Kings of 80’s pop - Phil Collins and Huey Lewis & the News. He entertains his guests by conducting critical discussions of why their music is better than some would believe and concludes his evenings by engaging in sex, violence, or occasionally both. This is the only sex scene you may ever see set to Sussudio. Watching himself in the mirror flexing, like an actor in one of his porno films, you see Bateman sense himself like a true master of the universe more consumed in himself than the women in his apartment.
Some circles have described American Psycho as a feminist statement. If this is what women think of us, then color me insulted. But there is credibility to be lent to such an argument as the tale is clearly an indictment of radical alpha male machismo and the chauvinistic tendencies that drive men to make attempts at controlling women. Consider the women in Bateman’s life. He is engaged to another materialistic socialite (Reese Witherspoon), but she is so inconsequential to his world that we see her in a scant few scenes. The other women in his life include his friend’s wife, Courtney (Samantha Mathis), a Lithium-addict who looks to Patrick to help keep her on her feet and fulfill her sexual needs in the way it becomes apparent that her husband doesn’t. Jean (Chloe Sevigny) is his loyal secretary, the kind of Girl Friday that secretly worships her boss. Then there are the prostitutes where we get to meet Christie (Cara Seymour), a sad-faced street hooker who is lured into Bateman’s world with a wad of money and calming sweetness. Yet everything is laced with such a tinge of black humor, that you’re liable to be smirking even through the blatant carnage. Observe the way Bateman runs through the hallway, naked and bloody, with a running chainsaw directly in front of his package.
Christian Bale is absolutely perfect as Bateman. After this film it’ll be hard to remember him as that little boy shouting at planes in Steven Spielberg’s Empire of the Sun. Perfectly hiding his British accent in favor of a more Preppy tone, Bale turns in the kind of star-making performance that you pray doesn’t get lost in the controversy or box office take. Leonardo DiCaprio (who originally turned down the role) would have been completely wrong for it, insuring certain disaster for what the film was trying to accomplish.
Patrick Bateman is a creation (much like Frankenstein’s monster) of the 1980s decade mentality of “me first”, a creature so devoid of any true emotions that he looks for the only outlet that he feels can make him whole and that’s murder. Fight Club did a vastly better job in displaying young men so disenchanted with the life they live that they turn to violence to feel like men again, but American Psycho is more metaphor than action. The film version is likely to be just as if not more controversial than the book, even if the majority of protestors will probably never see it. Those who do will probably focus more on the violent acts themselves than the overall statement of the film. As Dan Aykroyd says in Spies Like Us - “We mock what we don’t understand.” The final twenty minutes will, no doubt, have many people questioning exactly what they saw, but few will be able to forget some of the images, as humorous or disturbing as they may be.American Psycho plays like Oliver Stone’s Wall Street crossed with Natural Born Killers. It reminisces films like Fight Club, Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer and A Clockwork Orange, a blood-drenched cerebral satire about a period in our society that doesn’t seem too far removed from today’s headlines and attitudes. This is a film as much about perception as it is about rabid misogyny, evident from the opening credits when we see tiny droplets of red fall from the top of the screen – droplets which we assume to be blood only to be fooled into watching a dessert creation. American Psycho is not a film to be taken literally. It is a fable, albeit a dark and twisted one destined to be praised by some, abhorred by others and turned into a cult classic by even more.
link directly to this review at http://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=1380&reviewer=198
originally posted: 04/14/00 06:34:21
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USA
14-Apr-2000 (R)
DVD: 21-Jun-2005
UK
N/A
Australia
10-Aug-2000 (R)
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