The road to Halloween is paved with good films. Wherein we countdown to the spirited season with a hundred doses of horror. 27 days to go.
Halloween is fast approaching and in true horror fashion, Filmotomy are counting down to the single greatest holiday of every year with a collection of writers’ different films. There’s always been a film that has held a special place in my heart for many years, which I’ve never had the opportunity to write about, but now is the time.
It’s a distressing film that often gets categorised amongst the extreme side of cinema, something that I’m a fool for, and for good reason; it’s laced with misogyny, slathered in gore and exposes the sick mind behind how a serial killer thinks. That film is none other than Mary Harron’s 2000 satirical psychological horror film American Psycho.
Patrick Bateman is a successful Wall Street businessman who has it all. He’s young, rivetingly handsome, has the perfect body, a flash apartment, a beautiful girlfriend and can get reservations at the most exclusive restaurants in town. But with his pristine exterior comes a dark and deadly secret that truly exposes who he really is.
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His mind is riddled with obsessive compulsive thoughts, he likes drinking and taking drugs. But most of all he’s entertained by coercing woman back to his apartment where he tortures them, hacks them into little pieces and laughs all the while doing so. Bateman is more than just a businessman, he’s a twisted serial killer.
American Psycho is based on the book of the same name which was written by Brett Easton Ellis and published in 1991. Even though typically the film adaptation holds high praise and regard, author Ellis doesn’t regard the film as so important because at the time of release he stated that “I just didn’t think it needed to be made.”
Not because the film is necessarily a bad film, but because the book focuses heavily on Bateman as the narrator to the reader. However, he is an unreliable source of information and therefore leaves the reader in a state of confusion as to whether or not the events are unfolding truly as Bateman tells them. Or if we’re just listening to his own imaginary version.
Harron tried to add this element into the film, but due to the constricts of film, she made the events seem completely factual until we reach the end and begin to question if everything is a figment of his imagination. Another element that doesn’t quite come across in the film is just how nasty and gruesome the killings in the books are. There was only so much they were willing to show on screen at the time, which meant the slaughterings were significantly toned down for the audience. With this in mind, some of the most controversial and shocking parts that built the story of American Psycho are lost, but that doesn’t mean that Harron’s interpretation wasn’t one that worked.
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Regardless of how toned down the film is in comparison, it still features some exceptionally distressing scenes that really made waves with the horror audience. And threw off those who weren’t fully aware of what the film would entail. Upon its initial release some of the sexual aspects of the film were cut in order to pass as R-Rated for the cinema, which included a prolonged threesome with two prostitutes.
One of the most iconic scenes in American Psycho is during said threesome, where Bateman executes one of the girls during their sexual encounter which leaves the other in a state of pure terror and fleeing for her life. She’s subsequently hunted down by a naked and bloodied Bateman, who is in a state of maniacal ecstasy. Waving around a chainsaw like a lunatic and screaming at her as she does everything possible to save herself from becoming just another slaughtered girl in his repertoire. As she seemingly escapes down the stairs, Bateman uses his precision and knowledge of murder by waiting for just the right moment to drop the chainsaw and kill the woman who so desparately thought she was about to survive this massacre.
Even though this is a scene that shows blood and sexual violence, it’s not the visceral that disturbs the audience, it’s the psychological elements that play on your mind. Christie, played by Cara Seymour, has just witnessed a woman being brutally murdered during sex and cannot even begin to fathom the horrors that this monster will to do her. And just when she thinks she’s escaped, he still manages to get her. It leaves the audience with this feeling that no matter what, there’s no hope for these women and any that go within a mile radius of him are already dead because he has only one use for them.
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The story of American Psycho shows how Bateman doesn’t see women as anything other than bodies to be played with, dissected and disposed of at will. But it’s not just women that are the problem for him, he also doesn’t care much for men either. We see him axe apart one of his colleagues purely because his business cards are nicer than his, and because everyone keeps mistaking the two of them for one another.
Even though the film perverts Bateman as a misogynist with no care, respect or humanity for women, it also shows that he’s so consumed by his own maddenings that he will happily slaughter anyone if it means he gains something for himself. This is perhaps why it’s not so shocking that a woman directed this film, but it might also explain why the violence towards women exhibited in the book is much more subtle in the film.
The book implies rape, vicious sexual torture and even necrophilia. But the film steers clear of these tropes and rather lets the audience decide on the other awful things that Bateman might do to his victims.
The film has very well known names attached to the cast, including Reese Witherspoon, Chloë Sevigny, Jared Leto and William Dafeo, who all do an incredible job at playing their parts. The true star of the film is none other than Christian Bale who plays serial killer Patrick Bateman.
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Not only does he look the part with his smouldering glare, sensual pout and tight muscles, but he encompasses the psychotic personality that Bateman is reckoned with. He understands how to show the audience his obsessive nature. Constantly transfixed on who has the most expensive suit, who has the fanciest business card, dining in only the most exclusive restaurants, dating only the most wanted women and making sure that everyday he makes his face and body the perfect stature. Bale doesn’t hold back in his performance and terrifies the audience with his depiction of a heightened serial killer so imprisoned by his own thoughts and madness, that he has no self control of his depraved urges to abuse and dissect women.
American Psycho provides the audience with a strong societal commentary, focuses on a culture obsessed with success, money, looking good and being materialistic. It shows how the 1% live and how their only focuses in life are ones that give them personal gain, without the care of how they can impact the rest of society in a negative way. American Psycho is one of the greatest horror films of all time; with its disturbingly dark comedy, psychotic breakdowns of society and an unnerving look at the obsessive thoughts of a serial killer.
