MotW: American Psycho

My official rating for this movie is 8.6/10.

One thing this movie has is class, Christian Bale nails the elegance attribute for his character, and add to that all the 80's pop, you simply overflow the movie with its level of graceful smooth stylish taste; under a relatively modern light that is.

The movie basically tries to get into the deepest psyche of male psychology where as soon as the movie start you can relate.

Obviously not in the serial killer aspect, but in the playful imaginative way of looking at life under the eyes of that inner child we have that is regularly giving magical meaning to pretty ordinary events without noticing it.

The problem is that Bateman is not capable of separating that playful reality many people experience through thoughts, media, and art. He is actually cutting that bridge and directly affecting his life to the point that he loses the bridge between both realities.



That's just crazy, so the title of psycho fits perfectly here, a lack of empathy, and understanding of others, even of those close to him, where ego blocks any kind of rapport he may have in his relationships, turns him into a legitimately monster no one can relate to.

It is that back and forth with his personality where you want to relate and at the same time separate or distance yourself completely from his role as much as possible, what creates this identification with the character you don't know what to do with, other than trying to bring him to an end.



Personally this movie was easily heading towards a perfect 10. Reese Witherspoon, Jared Letto, Willem Defoe all selling their characters very well. What brought it down for me is reaching that point where you start to see clearly that bridge I was mentioning.

Once they show that the dichotomy of that world may very well be fictitious you feel robbed of your already establish assumptions that seemed cool in your head.

Which could be a very good thing on any other scenario, but here your initial assumptions are promptly replaced with a worthless male fantasy that you don't even want to be part of, and that you were trying to get away for the character from the beginning.



However the movie still uses ambiguity very well all the way to the end, and that bridge between reality and fantasy becomes unclear at times which leaves the movie with enough leverage to turn it into a classic.

I gave this movie a 4.5/5 back when I watched it almost three years ago. Christian Bale is amazing in this movie and there are so many great scenes, particularly the Huey Lewis and the News scenes. The only thing I'm not crazy about is the ending. I'd prefer something less ambiguous in this case. Ambiguous endings are fantastic when they work, but I felt like a more straightforward ending would have been better here.

One thing that I love is that Christian Bale is both in this movie and Batman, as Batman is pretty much an idealized version of this: the stupidly rich guy enacting his violent impulses and desires in secret. Except that Bruce Wayne views himself as a hero, even when commiting obvious crimes (like hacking every mobile in Gotham in The Dark Knight), while Bateman is conscious of how fucked up his desires are and how empty his life is. It's a far-fetched comparison, but I find it fun.

stratogustav - The best thing about the card scene is: the word "Acquisitions" is spelled wrong in every one of those cards, as "Aquisitions". They are all so self-absorved in their meaningless competition of who has the best card that they didn't even notice that they misspelled their own jobs.