American Psycho

[OG-]

Has anyone seen American Psycho or read the book? and if so can they explain what actually happened? i had therioes but never quite understood it.

[thmilin]

wow, no one responded to you yet?! ;)

I've seen it ... wrote a review on it actually, buried somewhere on another computer. In any case, it's a very black comedy based off a key book of the 1980s regarding the corruption of character in American society during that time. The rat race, the corporate ladder, the near religious superficiality. The book was bitingly sarcastic (so I've heard) and apparently the movie did a good job of capturing this.

Basic plot: A young "perfect" corporate guy is a virtually empty human who takes extreme care with his physical and social appearance. He is proud of his ability to "mask" himself. The opening has an amusing play on what the trailer dubbed his "mask of sanity." This guy's life is also pretty empty-false friends, no real love or warmth in his life, just superficiality. He has a kinky sex life which he does more for the fashion of it than the pleasure, and he gets more pleasure out of taping himself and posing than anything else. Then he goes off the deep end with his "game face" ... starts killing for fun. Film gets crazier and crazier with his behavior and antics, and all the time he does it with a huge smile (Christian Bale had his teeth straightened and whitened for the role).

The director got caught up in the things she was trying to say and lost her way between the humor and the sarcasm ... it got hysterical, to the point where I laughed I was so shocked at something over the top or just plain ridiculous. Something to watch though if only for something sharp and amusingly disturbing.

_____________

;) Why do I watch movies? If I didn't I'd be playing video games.

[Yoda]

I personally didn't see much of this movie (too young to see it all anyway)...but I did hear a rather funny part about business cards that I thought was fairly witty:

My God! It's got a watermark!

[thmilin]

my god man, go to bed!! ;)

actually, that whole scene about the business cards was just hilarious. they talked not only about the watermark, but the card stock, card color, print, and _centering_. Very sick. Bateman got so upset someone else's cards were better he perspired.

[Yoda]

Yes, I do remember some of that. Very clever stuff...offbeat, but very funny.

Hey, you're up too, arn't you? :) There is no rest for...uh...me. It's nearly 2AM here so I will be heading off to sleep soon.

Oh and congratulations - in just one day you've managed to become the 3rd highest poster here on MovieForums. :)

[OG-]

We'll thanks for the info. For what it was American Psycho was a good movie. I'm going to start reading the book for school. I liked the movie, except for the guy below me and my friends, wearing a trench coat. And whenever there was nudity on the screen, quite often, you could hear his coat rustling. It was the scariest party of the movie. That movie makes you look at people differently though.

[thmilin]

eww! was it Pee Wee? ;) Just kidding, I really like Reubens.

[OG-]

I just got done reading American Psycho, by Bret Easton Ellis. My god. This book is so graphic and disturbing. The images this book give you are burned into me mind forever. The detail that the author provides is so vivid and describitve that you can picture it all happening. And thats a picture I never wanted to see. As for the ending, which is why I started this thread in the first place, yes, he did kill all the people. Although in the book he killed almost double the amount of people. Although I do think the movie was a PERFECT adaptation of the book. It captured all of the emotions of it, yet still manages to do this with out as much sex, which the book was extra-describitive of, and gore, which was even more describitve. But the worst part about the whole American Psycho is, what kind of research did Ellis have to do for this book? He must be a real psycho.

[thmilin]

Hmm, it's actually part of a writer's craft to be able to let themselves go and sink into what they're writing ... be it about a psycho or whatever.

i'm a writer, by the way. and i've gone deep and far on various topics with just my imagination and had people write and talk to me like I've been through it too ... and when I tell them I haven't they're really shocked.

it is also part of the writer's craft to know how to hold onto the self and your sanity when you do it. so i'd hope this author of American Psycho ISN'T really that sick. ;) Just willing to go places most people aren't ... and to take you there along with him. He's obviously succeeded ... heheh.

[karenluvs6]

I watched this picture a few weeks ago and I am still trying to figure it out.
well, at least reading this thread has shed 'some' light on 'some' of the things that happened.
this was a really strange movie.

[OG-]

Yea it was a really werid movie. Very strange. Makes you think differently about people. Excellent acting though. Plot just needs work. Book is VERY weird though.

[ryanpaige]

I rented American Psycho last weekend, and while I enjoyed most of the movie, it just got too outrageous toward the end for my tastes (the throwing the chainsaw down the stairwell thing was a little over the top). And the film was certainly weird. I haven't read the book, either, so I can't compare the movie to the book.

[OG-]

If you thought the chainsaw bit was nothing compared to the crazy things he does in the book.

[Drop TheDeadDonkey]

Yeah, so he did do all the killings, yeah ?

So what was that bit at the end where his solicitor/lawyer (whichever side of the pond you're on) said that he'd had dinner with Paul Allen twice in Paris ?

Can someone answer me this ?

Ta,

DtDD

(personally I thought the movie was suprficial in more ways than one)

[ryanpaige]

Originally posted by Drop TheDeadDonkey
Yeah, so he did do all the killings, yeah ?

So what was that bit at the end where his solicitor/lawyer (whichever side of the pond you're on) said that he'd had dinner with Paul Allen twice in Paris ?

Can someone answer me this ?

The lawyer saying he had dinner with Paul Allen overseas could mean two different things. One, it could mean that the killings were all a figment of Bale's imagination. Or since all those Wall Street Types look alike (a running theme in the movie is that Bale's character is confused with someone else), the lawyer had dinner with someone he thought to be Paul Allen, but wasn't.

I think the whole point of the film is that you don't know whether the killings were real or not.

[moviegirl]

yeah i agree about the ending. it could mean two things--either that these people are all such the SAME people--all these corporate guys that it gets to be you can't tell them apart.

but i think what REALLY happened, and i haven't read the book so don't hold me to this, is that these were just figments of his imagination. he had nothing in his life, so he invented his life, and it got to the point where he didn't realize the difference between reality and his imagination. It would explain when Chloe Sevigny goes through his journal and finds all of the pictures. Also, it explains the ending, when that guy asks about him.

Brett Easton Ellis's characters are always unforgiving--these changeless creatures of the 80s. His commentary on that time period is what is most startling and interesting, I think.

[sunfrog]

What the?? That's not what I got out of the ending. I thought they knew he killed everybody but they were a respected company so they covered it up leaving him trapped in his role as a killer. You know how they say serial killers want to be caught, he wanted to be caught so it would end, but they covered it up and now he couldn't be caught so he was in misery. I thought this was a GREAT movie, I would buy it but people might think I'm some kind of psycho nut case because I love it so much. There's no question in my mind if he did it or not. I have no clue what you people are talking about. He was psycho, he killed everybody. Killing people because they have a nicer business card is not superficial, he was psycho. It made good sense to him. Son of Sam started killing people because of his neighbors dog's incessant barking. He thought the dog was trying to make him nuts. Either he was right or he was nuts already. It may not make sense to you and me but to a psycho it does. That's what makes them psycho. Sorry I'm getting worked up but I loved this movie. Where's my chainsaw? Lol> :) The chainsaw part was great too, btw.

[bigvalbowski]

I've read the book and seen the film. I preferred the movie because it didn't go into such detail about both the sexual and violent escapades of Bateman.

About the ending. The book was far more subtle in expressing the idea that the murders were all imagined. I think, the one flaw to Mary Harron's otherwise assured direction was the fact that she, more or less, emphasised the fact that Bateman was a murderer only in his mind, not in reality.

I mean, the chainsaw scene couldn't have happened in reality, could it? He threw the chainsaw done the stairs of an apartment building. Nobody heard the chainsaw. And the chainsaw landed directly on his victim. Nonsense! Bateman had an overactive imagination due to the sheer boredom of his existence.

[sunfrog]

Okay, so if he didn't kill them why didn't all the people he imagined dead appear in the closing scene alive and happy so we would know they were still alive?

[bigvalbowski]

Okay...

Notice the fact that everyone he kills in the movie is a complete stranger. None of them move in his social circle. If he was such a cold killer why didn't he kill the girlfriend who dumped him? Why didn't he kill the office pal who came on to him? It is my theory that everyone he kills was fictional.

The only exception to this rule was the killing of Jared Leto's character. Leto was a guy who he socialised with and yet he seemingly killed him. However, we find out later that Leto is alive and well. He's been sighted in London. WTF? But we saw the murder. Again, Bateman's imagination. Subconsciously Bateman knew that Leto was leaving for London, however the insane Bateman didn't know it. He's still a psychopath, even if the evil Bateman is very much a controlled animal.

Other points. Why was Bateman so frightened of the police officer? Because he's a scared yuppie. He's no tough guy! And the scenes where he mutters some term under his breath like: "What do you do?" - "Murders and Executions". However the person he is talking to hears this as "Mergers and Acquisitions". I think Bateman probably had the balls to say something like murders and acquisitions as long as he was in a loud, crowded room. However, Bateman doesn't have the cajoles to kill anyone.

[OllieO]

Bateman never killed anybody. The whole thing was a figment of his imagination. How many rounds did he have in his pistol? How many times have you seen a car blow up like that from getting shot at? And how accurate was he?

No, it was all in his head. That's why, IMHO, he was a psycho.

"Would you like me to bring you the menu?"
"Not if you'd like to keep your spleen..."

Hilarious!

"I can do a thousand."

Brilliant!

[ryanpaige]

Originally posted by bigvalbowski
The only exception to this rule was the killing of Jared Leto's character. Leto was a guy who he socialised with and yet he seemingly killed him. However, we find out later that Leto is alive and well. He's been sighted in London. WTF? But we saw the murder. Again, Bateman's imagination. Subconsciously Bateman knew that Leto was leaving for London, however the insane Bateman didn't know it. He's still a psychopath, even if the evil Bateman is very much a controlled animal.

One could theorize that Leto's character wasn't in London at all. We're merely told by someone else that he had lunch with Leto's character. But it's a running theme throughout the film that the yuppies all look alike and are often mistaken for one another (Bateman is mistaken for someone else in that very scene). It could be that Leto's character really is dead and someone else that is assumed to be Leto's character is in London.

(I didn't read the book, so I'm just going on the movie).

[d90yqv]

It's really very simple, as many people have said. Bateman is a nobody in a confused world in which his life means nothing. Hence the constant problems over identitfy amongst a group of people who define their lives by the quality of their business cards (a wonderful scene). Bateman pretends to kill to take the frustration out of his life, and it takes over his life to the extent that he begins to believe it's real. But it's obviously not - look at the way his gun never needs reloading, the chainsaw hits its mark, and the way the police car explodes - they are ridiculous deaths, which confuse him as much as the audience. When he realises that it's all in his head, then he can understand why there has been no catharsis for him - he remains in his compartmentalised life, unfulfilled, despite the women, drugs, and money. Fantastic film, great performances all round, and very brave of a woman to make such a male-dominated film.

[OllieO]

Nice one Webby :p.

[Aditya]

Hmmmm...the first time I saw "American Psycho" on DVD with a couple of my friends,we were real confused about the ending.I had NO clue :confused: at all what the ending about.It left me stumped and totally unsatisfied.I thought to myself-"What a waste of $5.This is probably to most stupidest movie I've taken." :( .I had read all the reviews that Bale was very good.I agree he was good.But the plot was loose and disconnected.

Now after reading this thread,I am beginning to wonder and understand what the movie was about.Well I guess my $5 is saved now. :)

Thanx a lot guys.I guess the movie isnt so stupid after all.
But they should've worked on the plot better.

Cheerios
Aditya

[OG-]

Anyone read about American Psycho 2?

Thats right, they are making an American Psycho 2. It's going straight to video!

It's going to star that chic from That 70's Show. Not the redhead, but the other one. It takes place like 10 years later, and has no characters from the first movie.

Heres a link about it:
http://www.upcomingmovies.com/americanpsycho2.html

[Yoda]

I'd heard that. I have to say, my first reaction was "Stupid." It's a non-sequel sequel, if you get my meaning. They're piggy-backing on the first one's success.

[OG-]

My thoughts exactly.

[ryanpaige]

By the way, Ain't It Cool News has a review of part of the American Psycho 2 script on the website right now (and, I will also note that some of the TalkBackers claim that Bret Easton Ellis and Mary Herron say there isn't supposed to be ambiguity regarding whether Bateman killed folks or not - that he did kill people, and it wasn't in his head. I haven't read said interviews, so I don't know).

[Viscuoa]

Originally posted by ryanpaige


The lawyer saying he had dinner with Paul Allen overseas could mean two different things. One, it could mean that the killings were all a figment of Bale's imagination. Or since all those Wall Street Types look alike (a running theme in the movie is that Bale's character is confused with someone else), the lawyer had dinner with someone he thought to be Paul Allen, but wasn't.

I think the whole point of the film is that you don't know whether the killings were real or not.

That my friend is why this movie is pure solid genius. I loved the movie despite what people may say. It functions sort of like Fight Club except there are no two characters that you can 'see', just Bateman. The movie is stylish, violent and intelligent -- just the right flavor for my tastes. I actually laughed at the killing and that drawing of the chainsawed girl he was doodling on the restaurant dining table lol!!!

and yeah, the card scene was great.

Definitely a good flick, recommended for people who like movies that make you think.

[Nikki]

I watched it on cable and thought it was different................

I liked it...............:yup:

[The Silver Bullet]

This film takes Fight Club and mops the floor with it, even though I do indeed love Fight Club.

My initial thoughts:

There was something that niggled at me throughout AMERICAN PSYCHO and it wasn't until it ended that I realised what it was. The film is ironic and caustic and cynical and cold, and is based on a work of contemporary American fiction [the most ironic and caustic and cynical and cold fiction on the planet] by Bret Easton Ellis. It was made one year after FIGHT CLUB (1999), which is ironic and caustic and cynical and cold, and is based on a work of contemporary American fiction by Chuck Palahniuk. Like FIGHT CLUB it is violent and spiteful and about the trappings of materialism and the culture that it has bred. The thing that niggled at me throughout AMERICAN PSYCHO is that when compared to FIGHT CLUB this film actually takes the subject matter and makes it work.

Don't get me wrong. I love FIGHT CLUB as pure anarchy and I believe that it is visually brilliant, wonderfully performed and masterfully directed. However, and you may call me crazy, but I believe that the source material for FIGHT CLUB just plain sucks. It tries to be something metaphysical. The whole Tyler Durden being a construct of the narrator is all very good and well but it is cliché and overused, and to me just typifies the risk of post modern cinema becoming old hat. Wow. They're the same person. Now tell the story backwards or some **** like that...

AMERICAN PSYCHO doesn't need an acrobatic plot to make its point. All it needs is a lead character that embodies corporate evil, allows it to destroy him, tries to redeem himself when he thinks he may be in trouble, and then realises that in this world, he doesn't have to. The narrator in FIGHT CLUB saves himself and Marla from Tyler Durden and Project Mayhem and there is hope. Patrick Bateman tells us at the end of AMERICAN PSYCHO that "this confession means nothing". And the human race is without hope. The ending to AMERICAN PSYCHO is true to life. Patrick Bateman can get away with murder. He doesn't have to redeem himself.

The cast list of AMERICAN PSYCHO is wonderful. Christian Bale. Willem Dafoe. Jared Leto. Justin Theroux. Reese. Each actor is used to the utmost of their abilities, and each is aided by some of the best writing of the late nineties. The coldness of AMERICAN PSYCHO, the cynical warmth of AMERICAN BEAUTY (1999), and the unbridled emotion of MAGNOLIA (1999) are three prime examples of why the late nineties (and early naughties) was one of the best periods for American screenwriters, and by association American cinema, of the last ten years. AMERICAN PSYCHO is nothing more than a collection of progressively insane scenes and sadistic/informative monologues, and yet it provides its players with pure gold time and time again. My personal favourite scene of the movie involves Justin Theroux and Christian Bale when they are in a bathroom at a club doing cocaine in a stall. A guy sticks his head over the top of the next stall over and says, "Will you guys shut the **** up? I'm trying to do drugs!" It is this sort of thing that not only fuels the heightening insanity of the film and provides the actors with magnificent scenes to play in, but rings true to the essence of the film. No one is trying to claim their dignity in AMERICAN PSYCHO, there are no laughable monologues about "farming maize on abandoned super highways" like there are in FIGHT CLUB. Just crazy mother****ers living life to the excess, doing coke in stalls, killing people, listening to Phil Collins, and becoming increasingly detached from reality. The characters aren't trying to pull themselves back from the brink in AMERICAN PSYCHO because they don't want to. Tyler Durden hates his world. Patrick Bateman loves his. And if the goal is to isolate the audience by showing them themselves, then showing them Patrick Bateman is the better option. We don't want to stop being consumers. We want to keep on buying. We want to keep killing. Each of us is our own little American psycho and each of our confessions mean absolutely nothing.

[Sexy Celebrity]

I agree. Fight Club is a spiritual movie for men, American Psycho doesn't give a **** about spirituality. It's a wonderful film. Both of them are.

Haven't seen the sequel, though. I wonder what it's like, with the femme fatale perspective.

[Fugitive]

I haven't seen Fight Club (probably cos I'm not a Pitt fan) but American Psycho flawed me. Absolutely brilliant! Christian Bale portrayed this to the max. I'm not too sure on the sequel, as sequels go, they can suck bad... I hope this won't be the case.

[Sexy Celebrity]

Originally posted by Fox
I haven't seen Fight Club (probably cos I'm not a Pitt fan)

I was gonna yell at you, but then I realized that the less amount of Pitt fans, the closer he is to me, after Jennifer is hypnotized and falls in love with Lyle Lovett, ala Julia Roberts.

I swear I saw Brad and Jennifer driving through Manassas, where I live, in late 2001! Why didn't I grab the steering wheel my sister was holding onto and crash into their car?!

[megma]

american psycho is better in general

[Fugitive]

Originally posted by Sexy Celebrity


I was gonna yell at you, but then I realized that the less amount of Pitt fans, the closer he is to me, after Jennifer is hypnotized and falls in love with Lyle Lovett, ala Julia Roberts.



:laugh:
SC you crack me up....
I did see Snatch tho... light humour that made me chuckle in parts.

[Balboa6]

Christian Bale should have won an Oscar for this or at the very least been nominated (but I think he should most definitely have won!)

[Fiscal]

My buddy painted this for me (strictly spray paint)

Can't wait to hang it up in my man cave

http://i781.photobucket.com/albums/yy100/taylorhickman/63273_500071688632_767578632_5804629_1061323_n.jpg

[SamsoniteDelilah]

My buddy painted this for me (strictly spray paint)

Can't wait to hang it up in my man cave

http://i781.photobucket.com/albums/yy100/taylorhickman/63273_500071688632_767578632_5804629_1061323_n.jpg:D That is awesome!

I just rewatched AP a couple of weeks ago, after reading an interview with BE Ellis. He said that at the time, the film was attacked by some women for mysogeny, and he classified that attack as "retarded". Having rewatched it with that in mind, I completely agree with him.

[planet news]

the goal is to isolate the audience by showing them themselves, then showing them Patrick Bateman is the better option.
Okay, I read the thread and liked back and forth banter about the reality of the murders. So far, I'm most taken with The Silver Bullet's analysis. The satire everyone keeps referring to is the fact that Bateman gets away with murder or at least admits it. I remember ash is the gal saying at one point that even though Bateman is a sick, perverted psychopath, he is still able to admit to himself at the end of the film that he is---that is, make a confession---whereas none of the others are even capable of admitting this. I really like Ash's idea that Bateman ends up being the "hero" of sorts. As Bullet said, we are all already American psychos.

Also, in regards to the forum's current Deleuzian climate, I can now fully appreciate the the film and novel's use of murder as a metaphor for consumerism. This ultra-exaggerated display of parasitic destruction and consumption of human libido is just about the most brilliant satire of Capitalism I've ever seen.

Bret Easton Ellis and Mary Herron say there isn't supposed to be ambiguity regarding whether Bateman killed folks or not - that he did kill people, and it wasn't in his head.If accurate, Harron's and Ellis's comments in this interview lend even more credence to this explanation of the narrative's intention.

===

Also, thank you for spawning the endlessly amusing CHECK MA DUBZ meme.

http://knowyourmeme.com/system/icons/1714/original/doublesguy.jpg?1262827702

[earlsmoviepicks]

I liked this movie, it shows how close all of us are to snapping. We enjoy violence when we feel self-rightous about it (vengeance movies, Mel Gibson exclaiming, "You killed my family. I"m coming to get you."). Only thing with Bateman is: he doesn't need a reason.

PS The major designer labels represented in the movie would let Bale wear their clothes, but only when he wasn't killing anyone. Hypocrites.

[Darkrose]

I just want to point out that I really don't believe anyone else could EVER look so good in sneakers and a chainsaw.

http://unrealitymag.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/155113__psycho_l.jpg

[mark f]

Maybe that's why he's a Hero. I just thought he was a Dick.

[TheUsualSuspect]

Looking forward to the stage musical.

[Darkrose]

^ huh?

[TheUsualSuspect]

http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2010/12/leaked-musical-numbers-from-the-new-american-psycho-musical.html

[planet news]

At first I was like: NO, NO, NOOOO!!!!

[your link]

Now I'm like: maybe...

[linespalsy]

My 2 cents:

It's been a while since I saw it. My impression of Bateman and the narrative reliability on one viewing was that he may have killed some but was also probably embellishing. Possibly insane but also a compulsive attention-seeker who gets attention by confessing (thereby puffing himself up), and the more outrageous the confession the better the attention. Even the fact that he's confessing might be unreliable (maybe he's just thinking about confessing and the entire narrative is solipsistic) but I'm not sure if that was an intentional implication and I'd need to watch it again to see how confident I can be about that interpretation.

It seemed to be very heavily influenced by Vladimir Nabokov's writing (unreliable narrator, self-conscious parody of the confessional literary genre) but more vulgar/accessible (less word-play, less-thoughtful structure, fewer and less-eclectic/abstruse references). At the time I saw it I though the pathetic insistence mixed with irony in the acting and story ("please watch me, I'm desperate"/"never-mind, I'm only acting pathetic and crazy to get you to watch me") in a somewhat blunt and annoying way but I can't describe my opinion of the film much more clearly than that at this point, just that I found it somewhat annoying. much more-so than Fight Club.

[Brodinski]

Also, thank you for spawning the endlessly amusing CHECK MA DUBZ meme.

http://knowyourmeme.com/system/icons/1714/original/doublesguy.jpg?1262827702

I couldn't help but lol when I saw that pic. That is the single greatest image I've seen on MoFo, except for Sexy Celebrity's recent Jake Gyllenhaal XMas avatar.

I might be back later with some thoughts on American Psycho, but can't be bothered right now. Studying for exams.

[TylerDurden99]

Just watched American Psycho last week. Christian Bale was great.

[Darkrose]

Imo, Christian Bale is one of the best actors of today. Now, I may be bias simply because I think he is absolutely gorgeous and is in Equilibrium, which is one of my favorite films of all time...but...

[Plainview]

Bale was great in The Fighter.

[Darkrose]

I didn't see that one. (Plainview, I still love the avatar).

[Lucas]

Great film. One of the best character-studies of the 21st century.

[Gideon58]

I love this movie...Christian Bale's brilliant performance should have earned an Oscar nomination and I don't know why, but I always find it a little unsettling to remember that this film was directed by a woman, considering the way Patrick Bateman treats all the female characters in the film.

[Mmmm Donuts]

^Maybe that's why it was so effective? Women surely have a better sense and experience of what a real bastard is, rather than a guy having to think about himself or other guys acting like that.

[bitbomb]

This movie made me a fan of Christian Bale, but that fandom ended up dying out. This and The Machinist are bloody fantastic performances (and fantastic movies), personally not a huge fan otherwise. Couldn't put my finger on why.

[mark f]

Obvious film; not bad, but not that good either. :)

[Mmmm Donuts]

Which parts were obvious to you??? :confused: :skeptical:

[mark f]

The whole movie.

[Mmmm Donuts]

Ok. And what parts were "not that good"?

[Pronstar]

Which parts were obvious to you??? :confused: :skeptical:

The ones when Bale gives his review of the music of the 80's