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All-Reviews.com Movie/Video Review
American Psycho
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  out of 4
Review by Susan Granger
½ star out of 4
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It's really hard to be objective about this picture. I
loathed it. But why? Based on Bret Easton Ellis's controversial 1991
novel, it revolves around Patrick Bateman, a vain, rich, vacuous Wall
Street stockbroker who becomes a serial killer. The profanity-laden
screenplay leaves much of the gruesome gore of the grisly
dismemberment and grotesque disembowelment of his victims to the
imagination and attempts, instead, to be a black comedy. For example,
the stylized opening sequence depicts crimson drops of what one might
assume is blood - but, in truth, they're drippings from a thick
raspberry sauce being poured over an exorbitantly over-priced poultry
entree served at a trendy Manhattan restaurant. Yes, Patrick Bateman
is a phony, obsessed with designer clothing, exercise, and pop
music. Writer/director Mary Harron and co-writer Guinevere Turner have
fashioned a sanctimonious social satire on the greedy excesses of the
'80s, and Christian Bale plays the psychopath with exuberant relish as
Reese Witherspoon, Chloe Sevigny, Willem Dafoe, and Jared Leto lend
support. Plus there's an abundance of male and female nudity with the
warm skin tones photographed in exquisite settings. But what made me
flinch was the cold, explicit glorification, the utter delight the
movie-makers took in the sleek horror of murder. To me, serial killers
simply aren't funny - no way, even if - as it's suggested
inconclusively - it's all in Bateman's warped mind. (Leonardo DiCaprio
was wise to have bailed out of this project.) On the Granger Movie
Gauge of 1 to 10, "American Psycho" is a reprehensible 2 - and it
should have been NC-17, not R. Trimming a sex scene involving a
threesome orgy does not make this film acceptable for a multiplex,
where young people can and do sneak in. I wish I hadn't seen it.
Copyright © 2000 Susan Granger
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