Entry #12: American Psycho
Christian Bale flew up to the status of super-stardom with portraying the titular superhero in Batman Begins, but much like future Batman performer Robert Pattinson, Bale spent his pre-Batman days doing a variety of bold smaller-scale films working with acclaimed filmmakers. For Bale, this meant getting to act under the guidance of names like Todd Haynes, Lisa Cholodenko and Jane Campion and also included the 2000 Mary Harron directorial effort American Psycho. This grisly social satire, adapted by a novel by Bret Easton Ellis, showed off the kind of acting chops that Bale would become famous for while also demonstrating Hanlon's knack for an insightful skewering of toxic masculinity.
In American Psycho, Bale plays Patrick Bateman, an investment banker with money to spare but, as his own voice-over narration informs the audience, little in the way of distinct humanity. Bateman has no empathy for his fellow human beings and his own personality is so generic that he's able to be confused for other people without anybody getting confused or catching on. Bateman isn't just vanishing from people's memory with ease though, he's also got a nasty habit of gruesomely killing people in his apartment, usually after waxing poetic for what seems like hours about his favorite musicians. Can anything catch up with Patrick Bateman? Given how often the wealthy get properly punished in real-life, surely there must be some kind of comeuppance awaiting Patrick Bateman!
American Psycho may have been released in 2000 but it feels disturbingly all too relevant in 2019. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that writers Mary Harron and Guenevere Turner were quite prescient in capturing toxic male behaviors (ones that have always existed) that have become amplified in the modern era. Bateman's repeated prolonged babbling about the underlying meanings for songs by Whitney Houston, Phil Collins and Huey Lewis feels like it could be prime material for any number of modern-day podcasts dedicated to white guys going on about what they consider to be revolutionary interpretations of pop music. Just as Patrick Bateman fits into the late 1980's Wall Street scene with ease, so too could he have fit snugly into the 2019 podcast scene.
The decor of the era may change but the basic tenants of what constitutes toxic masculine behavior remain eternal. American Psycho's exploration of that proves to be fascinating, especially since Harron and Turner thoroughly commit to this examination with a gut-punch of an intentionally anti-climactic ending that reflects the reality of how society allows this behavior to flourish. Their writing also excels when it comes to the elements of dark comedy stemming from representing Bateman's behavior in appropriately exaggerated ways. Much like Showgirls or Sorry to Bother You, American Psycho is dealing with societal inequality so over-the-top in the real world that the only way to properly translate it into a cinematic form is to have it manifest in equally stylized ways.
An early scene depicting Bateman's giddy excitement as he prepares for the slaying of Paul Allen (Jared Leto), for instance, is as cartoony as all out. Bale dials all his body language up to eleven as he practically jaunts around his apartment and it's a sight that manages to both convey how totally detached from basic humanity Patrick Bateman is and provokes your funny bone. Kudos for how the dark comedy in American Psycho is able to co-exist with a genuinely threatening ambiance can be chalked up to both the direction of Mary Harron and the lead performance of Christian Bale. This actor hasn't got a lot of chances in his career to show off his comic chops (not a lot of chances for yuks in Out of the Furnace) but he does really well with the numerous moments of dark comedy Patrick Bateman engages in.
I especially was amused by the gradually increasing levels of exasperation Bale imbues into his characters refrain of "I have to return some videotapes" that's used to get him out of any awkward social situation. It's so darkly comical how Bale's dialogue delivery on this line emphasizes the grisly dissonance between a guy having no hesitation about killing people but being irritated over somebody wasting a second of his time. As for Harron's aforementioned direction, she shows real skill in visually capturing moments of dark humor like the timing of a brief glimpse at a severed head in Bateman's fridge or the staging of a shot where Bateman holds up a comically enlarged power drill to the back of the skull of his secretary. Such moments of zany dark comedy appear all throughout American Psycho and are pulled off with such skill that they manage to enhance, rather than detract, from its insightful examination of toxic male behavior.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go return some videotapes.
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