Book vs Movie: American Psycho

Bret Easton Ellis's American Psycho is easily one of the most brutal and graphic novels ever written. The story is told in the first person by Patrick Bateman, a wealthy young man in his mid-20s. He is handsome, sophisticated, charming and intelligent. He works on Wall Street by day, he is a psychotic killer by night.

The novel is a brilliant portrayal of a guy who hates himself as he knows what a shallow, empty person he is, but he hates the world he lives in so much more that he goes around killing innocent people either because they have better things than he does --Paul Owen, to mention one-- or they damage society --such as homeless people and prostitutes. 

He is also obsessed with appearances, so much that he spends a lot of time telling the reader everything he owns, everything he wears and everything he eats. And he spends a lot of time telling what other people wear as well and giving fashion tips. The whole fashion talk, as I call it, is the only (or almost) part I hated about the novel. I don't care about fashion and it was truly annoying reading page after page of that. These were obviously left out in the film as you don't need to tell to the audience something they are already seeing --and it's not like knowing who the designer is is important to understand the character in the film-- and it's one of the aspects in which the film was better than the book.

Surprisingly, Patrick Bateman also does have a human side and we see it as he dedicates three whole chapters --Genesis, Whitney Houston, and Huey Lewis and the News-- to music. These three chapters are very important to understand Bateman's multiple personalities but also the spirit of the yuppie culture, emptiness. In the book, these are monologues that come pretty much out of nowhere; in the film, Patrick only says bits and pieces of them, almost in a humorous way, while murdering people. It's different but it is very interesting nevertheless.

Character-wise, Mary Harron's film is just as brilliant mainly because of the cast of Christian Bale. His performance is beyond sublime, capturing Bateman's conflicting aspects to perfection. We see his arrogance and overconfidence, but also his envy and insecurity. He delivers Bateman's sick sense of humour beautifully but most of all, he goes nuts for real. There's a scene toward the end, the confession scene, that is my absolute favourite. He talks and acts as if he was crazy for real, and makes that moment so much more intense than it was in the novel, and it's frightening, to be honest.

It's a completely different story for the other characters. They are not even paper-thin in the film, they are worse than that which takes away some of Bateman's ambiguity. I'm talking about his sexuality. There's definitely something going on, my guess is that he is homosexual. Gay both in the novel and the film --although his homosexuality is way more accentuated in the latter--, Luis keeps coming on to Patrick and really disturbs him and yet he never kills him. This is why the book made me think maybe Patrick feels something for Luis. Or maybe it's just his consciousness talking to him and preventing to kill people close to him. Either way, the character of Luis adds to Bateman's ambiguity in the novel. On the other hand, we have detective Kimball whose character is expanded in the film and is marvellously played by Willem Dafoe.

The biggest difference between the novel and the film, however, is the violence. The novel is way more graphic and disgusting than the film. The descriptions of the killings in the book are truly awful, especially the moment when he kills a gay man's dog which thankfully is only mentioned in the film in the famous phone confession scene, not to mention of Bateman eating and cooking his victims' body parts, from limbs to organs, or drinking their blood. We only see a few severed heads and corpses which is great as those things are too disgusting and horrible to appear on the film. I don't think anyone could bear to see those things. Unless it's a psychopath watching the film.

At last, there is the ending which is the same and yet completely different. It is very ambiguous in the novel as we aren't really sure whether Patrick killed all those people or he just imagined doing it; the only thing we know for sure is that he killed the cop because after that, when the chase starts, the first person is dropped and the story is narrated by a third person; the film is not that ambiguous. Actually, it seems to be saying that he imaged all, which is pointed out by two things that happen in the film. The obvious clue is at the end of the film when Patrick's secretary finds his diary depicting the drawing of the murders; the other is delivered by Dafoe's character. His change of attitude during the film makes the audience, and Patrick, believe he suspects him of the murder of Paul Allen --just in case you're confused, he is Owen in the book and Allen in the film. If he's so sure Patrick did it, how come he doesn't do anything?

Now you're probably wondering, and what about the realtor and Patrick's lawyer? How do you explain that? Well, we have to consider that Ellis's novel is also a commentary on society. Patrick's is a world where people only care about their own lives and appearances. Nobody is interested in listening what the other has to say; in fact, while flirting with a model, Bateman says he is into murders and executions and the woman mishears it as mergers and acquisitions. People only care about their own interest which would explain why Paul's apartment was completely clean and the realtor acts as if she knows nothing, although you can sense in the book and see in the film that she is scared of Bateman. After all, Paul's apartment is in a very beautiful part of New York City and acknowledging the murders would mean losing money if not the sale. As for the lawyer who claims Patrick could have not killed Paul because he had dinner with him in London the previous week, it is just not reliable. These Wall Street guys all look the same as they all have the same clothes, same glasses and same haircut, and they continuously mistake someone for somebody else. Bateman himself, for example, is often confused for Marcus Halberstram. The lawyer doesn't even not he is Bateman and believes he is some dude named Davis. The director herself said in an interview that she was not happy with the ending of the film because many people misinterpreted as a dream.

Despite the ending, Mary Harron's American Psycho is a brilliant adaptation and frankly, it's hard to say which is better, the book or the film.

Have you read the novel and/or seen the film? If so, which parts did you enjoy most and which least? And what's your theory about the ending?