The Ultimate Guide to the Best Horror Films Ever Made!
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
American Psycho (2000)
"A wealthy New York investment banking executive hides his alternate psychopathic ego from his co-workers and friends as he escalates deeper into his illogical, gratuitous fantasies."
Since I'm pretty sure that everybody has already seen "American Psycho" dozens of times, I'm not actually going to waste my time writing a review of the movie itself. We all know what it's about, what happens and how ambiguous it all is.
I just rewatched the "Uncut Version" DVD with Mary Harron's director's commentary on and it was that which interested me the most. I learnt a lot from it including how I'd never even thought about the fact that "American Psycho" was filmed as a period piece and didn't know that most of the scenes were filmed in Toronto not New York.
I hardly ever go through the director's commentaries or special features on a DVD but this time I did mainly because it was another totally unexpected snow day and I didn't have anything better to do. Some of the little featurettes on the DVD could have been better including the ones with the girl singer from a band that I've never heard of who wouldn't remove her sunglasses for some reason and there was a least one occasion where "American Psycho" was spelled wrongly as a caption. The typo "pyscho" is pretty common but you would have thought that whoever put the DVD together would have caught it.
Anyway, I just thought that I'd better write something to prove that I'm still alive and watching horror movies even if it is just "American Psycho" yet again. It's not my favourite film but I do think that it's Christian Bale's finest performance. I still like all the horror elements though I'm not entirely sure that the whole thing isn't just a comedy really.
It also dawned on me that I've never actually read the supposedly controversial novel of "American Psycho" and I still have no desire to. As a movie, "American Psycho" is pretty much perfect as it is. I don't see any need for yet another remake or even trying to imagine it being done any other way. I'm sure that one day some bright spark will try to do it again with a much bigger budget and a ton of arty-fartiness thrown in for good measure and it will suck even more than "American Psycho 2" which I have the misfortune of owning a copy of.
Is "American Psycho" your favourite film? What do you think of it? Is it really horror? Let me know in the comments below.
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It's not my favorite, not even in the top 20, but still enjoyable. The book is worth a read though. As you say, the film is ambiguous. You are led to believe that the whole thing merely happened in his mind.
ReplyDeleteI found the book more clear cut. To me, the book's Bateman was definitely a killer, no ambiguity about it.
Unfortunately, there a several sprawling chapters listing, for example, the complete musical history of Phil Collins or Michael Jackson. A crime worse than any commited with a chainsaw or knife, in my opinion.
Patrick Bateman's worst crime is not his psychopathy, it's his terribly mainstream and unimaginative taste in pop music!
ReplyDeleteI couldn't stand this movie. We got it from Netflix and in all honesty, it's probably one of the worst films I've seen in 10 years. I love Christian Bale, I think he's a fine actor and I think he does a great job in this film, but the story would have been better if they hadn't made an almost comedy spectacle out of it. I laughed through most of this. I think it's just that the style they used here isn't something that clicks with me. And, it's not horror. Not in my book.
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