Search - American Psycho on DVD

Lacked focus

Elisabeth | 08/24/2010

(2 out of 5 stars)

"** REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS **

In the beginning, I found this movie compelling to watch. We see Patrick (Christian Bale) as a businessman who's a little too smooth, a little too perfect. He's got this artificial voice that makes him sound like a DJ for smooth Jazz. And he's got the exfoliated, overly-cleansed, smooth skin to match. It was interesting seeing him peel off his beauty mask, like a literal mask of perfection he peels off when he gets home and his dark side emerges. This movie also pokes fun at the artificialness of yuppies.

However, it quickly turns into one of those jokes that was funny the first time, but soon gets old the more you hear it. This movie suffers from being too repetitive. Even the murders get repetitive after awhile. Patrick feels competitive, then angry, then puts on a soundtrack, which he explains in great detail, and then kills...over and over again.

I had two other problems with this movie, too. The first was trying to figure out what motivated Patrick to kill. Did he kill because he felt superior to others or inferior to others?
He talks about how disgusted he is with the people he works with and women in general, which makes me think he kills because he feels superior. He even kills a homeless man who tells Patrick he thinks Patrick is a good man, which tells me he's disgusted by kindness and feels above that emotion.
But then he also acts hyper competitive with his boss as well as colleagues, whom he constantly compares who has the better designed business card. And since he kills soon after these instances, it tells me he actually feels inferior instead.
His needing to control women and tell them how to dress and act both spell a feeling of superiority (feeling disgusted by how easily manipulated they are), but also inferior in that he even needs to control them at all (like he's afraid if he didn't control them, they could easily control him instead).

The second problem was whether Patrick wanted to be stopped from killing again or memorialized for his killing.
Confessing to one man and pleading with his secretary (even sparing her life) tells me he wants to be stopped. But earlier he had talked about serial killers like Gacy and Bundy as if they were his heroes, so that tells me he wants to be memorialized instead.

Because this movie lacks focus, it doesn't know which direction to go in or how to end, so instead, it cops out by saying this was all just a fantasy. The whole fantasy angle could've still worked had Patrick never been a part of the business world at all (and this is just how he imagined this world would look like), but he is a part of it, which makes it confusing to know what really happened and what didn't.
Although I think Christian Bale is a good actor who makes interesting choices, this one didn't work for me.

"

One of the Darkest Films You'll Ever See

Kevin Wallace | 07/19/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I was intrigued by American Psycho when I initially heard about it. I didn't really know much other than Christian Bale kills a lot of people. Having watched it, this movie is probably one of the darkest if not the darkest film you may ever watch. It is very gory and quite disturbing at points. However it is quite thought provoking. It raises large questions about life and how one should live it. How we interact with others is a major theme of the movie. I was thinking something along the lines of Hannibal Lecter when I purchased this. It is not quite as thrilling, but far more terrifying in its insanity."