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Every woman’s worst nightmare: American Psycho’s
Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale).
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Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale) is one joyful psycho. He dances a feverish jig around his guest. He kicks up his heels with boyish glee.
Newspapers are scattered across the apartment floor. You would think his Wall Street colleague, Paul Allen (Jared Leto), would realize something is up.
Bateman's agenda is made clear after he reaches for a transparent rain slicker and a gleaming axe. It's not long before his apartment is swamped in blood.
Setting Bateman's ax swinging against the banal '80s Pop of Huey Lewis and the News' "Hip to be Square" offers American Psycho director Mary Harron her best chance at droll horror satire. It's surprising how dull the bloodletting turns out to be. The jokes about Bateman's status-conscious ways and 1980s lifestyle never quite hit their target. A bevy of screaming victims fail to generate any thrills. American Psycho is a slasher parody that neither makes you laugh nor scream.
Bret Easton Ellis' 1991 novel received plenty of controversy for its long passages of detailed violence. Harron's film adaptation -- co-written with Guinevere Turner -- stays true to the core story, following the escapades of Bateman, a 1980s Wall Street-yuppie-turned-serial-killer, and his psychopathic ways.
Harron pushes Bateman's bloodletting to the sidelines. There's more gore in a typical Hollywood actioner. In the movie version of American Psycho, details are reserved for material goods.
The camera caresses every inch of Bateman's stark, Upper Eastside apartment. It's as if Elle Decor produced the film. The furniture is modern. Bateman's kitchen is an oasis of polished stainless steel filled with expensive appliances for the person who never cooks. A sub-zero refrigerator holds a container of sorbet. It's also the perfect place for a woman's severed head.
There's twisted comedy in the fact that Bateman's bloody carnage takes place in an arena of tasteful black leather, light-colored walls and carpet. It's no wonder he spreads newspaper across the floor.
The blood splatters across Bateman's face with dramatic flourish. It's the one scene of slapstick horror that works. Much of the credit goes to the Welsh-born Bale for screaming so believably. Chloe Sevigny as Bateman's gushing secretary and Reese Witherspoon as a debutante girlfriend offer bubbly support. But Bale's credible madman performance is the film's best attribute. He makes all the Hollywood debate over the possible casting of teen heartthrob Leonardo DiCaprio fade away.
Like the film itself, Bale never manages to create an anti-hero that's more than dramatic veneer. He looks the part of every woman's worst nightmare: a wealthy, stylish, good-looking date who can't wait to take a chainsaw to your head. Bale's droll Manhattan accent rolls off his tongue with a deadpan clip. But by the film's closing credits, he has lost the battle to breathe life into American Psycho. His madman is more chiseled mannequin. American Psycho leaves you wondering what Bale might have done with a more substantial character.
Twenty seconds of footage was edited from the non-rated version of American Psycho that I watched earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival. Missing from this R-rated version are scenes of pelvic thrusting between Bateman and two hookers. I found the difference negligible after watching the commercial version at a local multiplex. Bateman flexes his muscles and watches himself in a mirror. He videotapes the tryst, but you know it's just so he can watch himself over and over again. For Bateman, women are nothing more than life-size vibrators. Basically, sex isn't any more erotic than aerobic exercise in American Psycho.
Controversy remains the best buzz money can buy and American Psycho is the first "controversial" film of 2000. But I can't imagine the film upsetting anyone who's seen it. Unlike recent films that also attracted society's ire -- Priest, The Last Temptation of Christ and Jean-Luc Godard's Hail Mary -- American Psycho lulls.
The irony is that American Psycho the movie is being derided for its violent storytelling despite the fact that Bateman's carnage is kept off-screen. The film's best joke is how a serial killer like Bateman manages to keep things so tidy. Of course, there is the matter of his dry-cleaner being unable to clean his bloodstained bed sheets.
The rare jolt comes from the slash of air whenever one of Bateman's Wall Street colleagues whips out a business card. But take away Bateman's hints of gore and interior surface details, and you're left with empty-handed storytelling. For a satirical stab at vacant consumerism, American Psycho is pretty vacant.
Harron's goal is to make the film more '80s satire than slasher thriller. We're meant to laugh at the sleek jabs against the high living '80s. But peel away the chic interiors, well-cut suits and 1980s soundtrack and you're left with little story. Controversy should never be this mediocre. Audiences are the real victims here.CityBeat grade: D.
