Intermission: 'American Psycho' gives dark, disturbing vision

"American Psycho"

Directed by: Mary Harron

Starring: Christian Bale, Willem Dafoe, Reese Witherspoon, Samantha Mathis, Chloe Sevigny

Rated: R

In 1991, novelist Bret Easton Ellis, still riding high on the success of his book (and film) "Less Than Zero," caused quite a fuss with the release of "American Psycho." Feminists vilified the novel as grotesquely misogynistic; other readers couldn't get past the endless stream of designer label name dropping; and then there was the violence.

Described in excruciating detail, the murders in this work were enough to turn the stomachs of all but the most jaded reader. What people generally seemed to miss was Ellis's main point. "American Psycho" was the blackest hue of a dark comedy and a scathing indictment of the money-obsessed 20-something generation that hit the high-dollar workplace during the greed-driven Reagan '80s.

All of these elements combined to keep the novel out of Hollywood production for nearly a decade. When the film finally did get made, by director Mary Harron whose previous work, "I Shot Andy Warhol," was an interesting look at another subculture from an earlier decade the troubles were far from over.

"American Psycho" was first slapped with the MPAA's kiss of death, the dreaded NC-17 rating. Keep in mind, the rating wasn't because of the violence in the film it's all still there but because of a very short, fairly nondescript, scene depicting a sexual encounter between the "hero" of the film and two women. It's really time the MPAA got a grip on itself and started doling out ratings with some sort of consistency.

The NC-17 was originally devised to differentiate between films with artistic merit and a typical porno movie that would still get the old standby X rating.

It's never worked that way, however, and now an NC-17 pretty much spells commercial disaster for any movie unwilling to make the concessions to the board and change three seconds here and there to satisfy someone's idea of acceptable viewing.

Anyway, the film got made, the 10 seconds were cut, the sought-after R rating was obtained and audiences everywhere can squirm their way through an hour and 45 minutes with one of the strangest characters to front a film in quite a while.

Christian Bale is great as Patrick Bateman, the self-absorbed yuppie stock broker who describes himself as having "... all the characteristics of a human being, but not one discernible emotion except greed and disgust."

Bateman is obsessed with clothing, expensive watches and shoes, keeping in shape, his appearance, body gels and cosmetics. And oh, he does his daily workout watching movies like "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre."

He, and everyone around him, is so caught up in material concerns that there is no spiritual center to their universe. This was the point Ellis made in his book, and Harron captures it very well on film. In an early, darkly hilarious scene, Bateman and his colleagues engage in a bizarre ritual of masculinity when they begin comparing business cards. The paper stock, the ink, the typeface and embossing no detail is left unexamined.

Bateman's vacuity eventually overtakes him, and in what plays out as an extended fever dream he begins a quiet, murderous rampage, killing friends, acquaintances, homeless people and hookers. Harron has steered away from the painstakingly described killings of the book, but the implied violence and utter sociopathic philosophy of Bateman make for many an uneasy moment.

Patrick's love life is as screwed up as the rest of his existence. He's engaged to Evelyn (Reese Witherspoon) who blathers on relentlessly. At one point Patrick confesses some of his murderous sins, but Evelyn goes right on jabbering about their engagement plans. He has a mistress who is the fiancee of a coworker and a junkie. He also courts his timid secretary, played by Chloe Sevigny, for sex or murder, we're never quite sure. And then there are the street hookers and call girls, who begin to complain about Bateman's penchant for rough sex. If they only knew ...

Harron's work pares down Ellis's novel into a nice shape for film. If you've seen "Glengarry Glen Ross," "In the Company of Men," "Boiler Room" or "Fight Club," you're already familiar with the type of characters presented here. Like "Fight Club," "American Psycho" relies heavily on a third-act plot twist, and it's one that I'm sure will spark many a debate of what really happened earlier in the story.

I still haven't quite figured it out, but the confusion tends to add to, rather than detract from, the power of this rather disturbing and dark look at recent American history.

(Jim Wunderle works at Associated Video Producers and is a Springfield free-lance writer and musician.)