"B: "What exactly do you mean? Did the murders really happen, or did Bateman just imagine it all? What did Patrick Bateman do to Christie and Sabrina? [] And so we really set out, and we failed, and we've acknowledged this to each other, we really set out to make it really clear that he was really killing these people, that this was really happening. What is the significance of mistaken identity in the film? Bateman also reveals that he still does the occasional line of coke and is still taking Xanax. -Graham S. Would not have made it through AP Literature without the printable PDFs. Paul Allen is on the other side of the room over there." Edit, This is the most frequently asked question in relation to the film, and the answer remains ambiguous. It is clear he does have a mental illness, and is delusional. Teach your students to analyze literature like LitCharts does. It is simply another component of his psychosis, which also includes fantasies of killing and torture. He's probably going to hurt or kill the prostitutes, which is why they're trying to get away from him. The movie we only get minor tellings of these, and usually it's when he is comparing himself with someone else.When Bateman talks with Paul Allen about Huey Lewis and the News, as well as the escorts about Phil Collins, and Whitney Houston. Instant downloads of all 1699 LitChart PDFs Its almost as if hes blacked out while narrating. He shows no remorse in business, in his personal life and during his murders. [p. 5] Another good example can be found when Bateman and his colleagues are at a restaurant called Pastels; Some guy who looks exactly like Christopher Lauder comes over to the table and says, patting me on the shoulder, "Hey Hamilton, nice tan," before walking into the men's room. Bateman does however make a short appearance in Glamorama (1998), which has not, as of yet, been adapted into a film. You'll also get updates on new titles we publish and the ability to save highlights and notes. Complete your free account to access notes and highlights. LitCharts Teacher Editions. He tries to confess, but he simply can't get anyone to take an interest. However, Patrick covers himself up as being Paul Allen. He is involved in only one violent incident during the period documented (from March 15th, 2000 to April 17th, 2000); he breaks the jaw and crushes the trachea of a beggar who tries to mug him at an ATM.Various characters from the film/novel are also mentioned. How can Harold Carnes have had lunch with Paul Allen in London when Allen is already dead? According to the film's official website, the videotape addiction is a metaphor for Bateman's "emotional isolation"; he has no real life himself, no real existence to keep him occupied, so he needs to fill that emptiness by continually immersing himself in the lives of others, i.e. It subsequently transpires that Bateman's psychiatrist, Dr. M, is in fact having an affair with Jean, and the two have fallen in love. And I always tell them, in our minds it really happened. The whole message I left on your machine is true. Nobody can tell each other apart, it's all very empty, it's shallow, it's competitive, and it makes men look really really bad, and it makes them look kind of gay, because it is such a mans' world, and they are so obsessed with how they look, with clothes and their business cards, that it's taking that competitiveness to an aesthetic level that's kind of what we think of as how gay men are; impeccable dressed, impeccably groomed, really concerned with each other, and women are an outside factor. Later on, he chases a hooker named Christie with a chainsaw and somehow manages to kill her by throwing the chainsaw down many flights of stairs. In this sense then, Bateman serves as a metaphor, as do the very real murders. A Stephen Hughes said he saw him at a restaurant there, but I checked it out and what happened is he mistook a Herbert Ainsworth for Paul. He also argued that the film worked as a thematic companion piece to Harron's previous film, I Shot Andy Warhol (1996), a film about Valerie Solanas, who tried to shoot Andy Warhol in 1968, likening Bateman to Solanas. "C: "Because I had dinner with Paul Allen twice in London, just ten days ago. or listening to Kenny G on his Walkman; on his dates; during his exercise regime to perfect a lean sculpted body; the occasional murder he commits; his facials; dining out with colleagues; watching horror and porn videos; and constantly looking at himself in mirrors (even during sex), which of course, reveals nothing, and the movie - presented in gleaming wide-screen - is a visual representation of his mindset: sleek, cold, airless, a world where everything is ultimately about style. This break is never explained are there events Bateman is hiding or doesnt remember, or is he merely skipping to the good stuff? From here on in he becomes even more of an increasingly unreliable narrator. As such, if this scene is an hallucination, the question must be are all of his murders hallucinatory? Indeed, the only time in the novel when someone does acknowledge that Bateman is a little unusual is when he doesn't order hash browns with his dinner at a restaurant called Smith and Wollensky, prompting McDermott to call him, "a raving maniac" (p. 363).As with the question of what happens in the conversation with Carnes, there are two primary schools of thought on why people never seem to react when he says these things:(1) As with Carnes, the first theory is a practical one which argues that people can hear what he says, but just don't care. Similarly, in the novel, when Bateman arrives at a club called Tunnel, he looks around and muses to himself "Everyone looks familiar, everyone looks the same" (p. 61). After a particularly infuriating party, Bateman asks Evelyn why she doesn't just date Bryce instead of him, pointing out that Bryce is rich, good-looking and has a great body, to which Evelyn replies, "Everybody's rich. The incident made the nightly news and the front page of every newspaper in Santa Cruz. "People wanna get caught": Bateman meets Kimball by chance in a nightclub and Kimball tells him that in casual situations, people often reveal things about themselves even though they don't realize they are doing it. Another example is when Bateman is trying to break up with Evelyn, telling her, "My need to engage in homicidal behavior on a massive scale cannot be corrected," to which she tearfully replies, "If you're going to start in again on why I should have breast implants, I'm leaving" (p. 338). Ellis also appeared on an episode of Charlie Rose (1991), along with Christian Bale and co-screenwriter/director Mary Harron, where he said he liked the film very much, and felt it improved on the novel in certain aspects; "the film clarified the themes of the novel. In this first encounter, the reader can see the clear distinction between the sexual part of the evening and the violent part of the evening these two aspects of Batemans life will soon start to blur together, however.. "My students can't get enough of your charts and their results have gone through the roof." Similarly, George Corsillo, who had designed the jackets for Ellis' previous work, turned down the American Psycho job, citing "creative differences. However, he misses the chair and crashes through a glass table, severing his artery and bleeding to death (as Davis puts it when leaving the building; his father "had fallen and couldn't get up". No matter what he says or what he claims to have done, the people around him just don't react. It's almost like alienation breeds serial killers, everyone's so disconnected, it really doesn't matter, it doesn't matter who you kill, it doesn't matter what you do. "In the light of the ensuing controversy, Simon & Schuster decided not to go ahead with publication, citing "aesthetic differences." However, Bateman instead finds no remains and a cold realtor who informs him . As he goes more crazy, what you actually see becomes more distorted and harder to figure out, but it's meant to be that he is really killing all these people, it's just that he's probably not as nicely dressed, it probably didn't go as smoothly as he is perceiving it to go, the hookers probably weren't as hot etc etc etc It's just Bateman's fantasy world. I stand up and walk over to the armoire, where, next to the nail gun, rests a sharpened coat hanger, a rusty butter knife, matches from the Gotham Bar and Grill and a half-smoked cigar; turning around, naked, my erection jutting out in front of me, I hold these items out and explain in a hoarse whisper, "We're not through yet" An hour later I will impatiently lead them to the door, both of them dressed and sobbing, bleeding but well paid. Ellis has stated that the novel was intended to satirize the shallow, impersonal mindset of yuppie America in the late 1980s, and part of this critique is that even when a cold-blooded serial killer confesses, no one cares, no one listens and no one believes. What is the name of the song when Bateman is walking with the woman in the street? I'm Patrick Bateman. What does Bateman do to Christie and Sabrina after the first threesome? You of all people should know how that feels, Mr. Wall Street" (283). However, at no point does anyone ever react in any way seriously to what he says.Examples of Bateman's outbursts include; in the nightclub early in the movie, Bateman says to the bartender (Kelley Harron), "You're a fucking ugly bitch. (The production designer Gideon Ponte, deserves special mention for the awesome, glamorous sterility of Bateman's bachelor pad.) PDF downloads of all 1699 LitCharts literature guides, and of every new one we publish. The original text plus a side-by-side modern translation of. Creating notes and highlights requires a free LitCharts account. This conversation is discussed in the next question.As to the overall significance of mistaken identity, one of the running themes of the film and the novel is that everyone looks like everyone else, everyone dresses the same, listens to the same music, has similar jobs, goes to the same clubs and hairstylists, etc. Up to his old tricks, Bateman leaves Elizabeth hanging while he goes in search of a prostitute this is just what he did to Courtney the first time he hired Christie. Elizabeth is clearly only interested in Bateman for his money, arguing with him that a restaurant even favored by the idyllic Wall Street man, Donald Trump, wasnt good enough. PDF downloads of all 1699 LitCharts literature guides, and of every new one we publish. "Then, in their last scene together, Kimball tells Bateman that according to Allen's diary he was having dinner with Halberstram the night he died (which is correct insofar as Allen thought Bateman was Halberstram). "As for major differences, there are many as there are even entire scenes from the book left out of the movie.Much of the novel is described in terms of people's clothing and the accessories they wear, as in the yuppie lifestyle, is how they see who has the better lifestyle. A writer from The New York Times wants to do a piece on his remarkable success for the paper's business section, Architectural Digest have photographed his apartment for a special issue on luxury homes. After Al is dead, Bateman stomps on the dog, however, we don't actually see him stomping on it, he raises his foot and the camera cuts to a wide angle where we hear the dog yelp. He said that this was not the case, and that people only find these links between his career and personal life because they want to. What are the differences between the novel and film. It is introduced in the opening scene in the restaurant. I should have left it more open ended. However, within a few days, it transpired that Koch Records, the publishers of the soundtrack, hadn't obtained the publishing rights to "Hip to Be Square" by Huey Lewis & The News (separate rights needed to be acquired for each song; one for the movie and another for the soundtrack). We're just making so much fun of him. For Wolfe, selling the apartment is her single guiding principal; everything else is supplanted. Similarly, upon saying hello to these people, they usually respond by calling Bateman the wrong name. It should slip between the two, I don't think you can find the meaning in one answer. This aspect is also emphasized in a deleted scene on the DVD. Two Improvised Scenes Ended Up In The Movie. The CD was immediately recalled (although a few thousand had already sold), and replaced with a new CD without that particular song on it. They lie quietly on either side of me, sometimes touching my chest, once in a while running their hands over the muscles in my abdomen. He was especially pleased that the film depicted Bateman as extremely uncool, a total loser.The only parts of the film that Ellis criticized in his review were Bateman's dance prior to killing Paul Allen (Jared Leto), which he felt was too close to slapstick humor (ironically, this is Harron's favorite part of the film), and the voice-over which runs throughout the movie, which he felt was "too explicit." Also includes a behind-the-scenes interview with Reese Witherspoon about sexuality in 1980s America. However, for those who know the novels upon which the films are based, there are a number of implicit connections. Bret Easton Ellis: Mary Harron's American Psycho is set mostly in pre-crash 1987 but it's a period that almost seems as distant as the Jazz Age or the swinging 1960s London of Austin Powers. Instead, there is a scene where Sean mentions talking to his brother on the phone.There is no connection between Bateman and either the novel (1985) or the film version of Less Than Zero, or the short story collection (1994) or film version of The Informers. (including. Edit, The online sequel, Am.Psycho2000, was a series of e-mails written from Bateman to his psychiatrist which were sent to subscribers to the film's official site in the months leading up to the release of the film. The scenes from the novel where Bateman slices a dog's stomach open and cuts its owner's throat, where he drowns Evelyn's dog, and where he crushes a rat by stomping on it are not in the film, nor is the infamous scene from the novel where he tortures a girl by putting a live rat into her vagina. Even a fancy dinner and a ride to their favorite bar in a limousine arent interesting enough for the two, so Bateman gets a craving for drugs or so he says. Here, money and sex are interchangeable in a certain kind of way of looking at the 80s, in which money was the erotic object, it was the source of eroticism in the 80s.American Psycho: From Book to Screen (2005)] Detailed quotes explanations with page numbers for every important quote on the site. Vintage was an imprint of Alfred A. Knopf Inc., who published trade paperbacks only, under their Vintage Classics label. Trying to feed the cat into the ATM is sort of a giveaway. Another idea is that the videotapes offer a commentary on Bateman's mindset. This is a gauge for Batemans hallucinations; perhaps this encounter is real and its memory unclouded. Not only are they socially and psychologically uniform, but they accept and promulgate that uniformity, reveling in one another's anonymity as it necessitates that personal relationships are superfluous to the achievement of their ultimate goals - success and wealth. And we get to the scene where he's crying on the phone and confessing to his lawyer what he did, and then his lawyer doesn't even really know who he is. What starts to happen as the movie progresses is that what you're seeing is what's going on in his head. The acquisition of wealth supersedes all other goals, being successful becomes more important than being moral. PDFs of modern translations of every Shakespeare play and poem. Over the years, this has built up into a myth that Lewis objected to the use of his song when he saw the film, and demanded that it not be included on the soundtrack. The names were changed since it was later discovered that there were real people who worked on Wall Street with those names, and they production could run into trouble down the road.Also while most of the dialogue from the novel is similar in terms of wording, they are slightly changed up to match the actors portraying the characters.The scene were Bateman sleeps with the two escorts, the novel he uses the word Rolex. By not asking the girl her name, Bateman further objectifies and dehumanizes her. That's not Reed Robinson." In another scene, he tells a Chinese woman (Margaret Ma), "If you don't shut your mouth, I will fucking kill you." Bateman also informs us in voiceover that Marcus Halberstram does the exact same thing at the company as he does, so presumably Halberstram is a vice president as well. What mental illness does Patrick Bateman have? When Bateman awakens from his crime spree and subsequent confession, he immediately goes to Paul Allen's apartment to clean up the remains he left there. Bateman picks up a nearby kitten and lifts it up to the ATM slot, pointing his gun at its head. Is that true? And that's very disturbing. PDFs of modern translations of every Shakespeare play and poem. What are the differences between the R-rated cut and the unrated cut of the film? Why is it that when Bateman says something vile, people never seem to react? From the creators of SparkNotes, something better. What is the significance of mistaken identity in the film? Like Boxing Helena (1993), there's just a lot of stuff like that. DERRICK BRIAN BATEMAN. American Psycho. [p. 48] Later, in the Yale Club, I make my way slowly through the dining room, waving to someone who looks like Vincent Morrison, someone else who I'm fairly sure is someone who looks like Tom Newman. Some even wonder if he has a mental illness, since some believe he did not murder anyone and it is all in his head. Otherwise it was amusing. Is that Edward Towers? His masseuse, Manfred, does callouts only to Bateman and a member of the Rockefeller family. For example, New York ran a cover story on the novel and on Mehta's purchasing of its publication rights, and CNN read extracts from the novel live on-air.Upon Vintage's acquisition of the rights, feminist activist Tammy Bruce, president of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW), called for a nationwide boycott of all Vintage and Knopf books, with the specific exception of those by feminist authors, although she did call on such authors to sever their relationships with both companies. "C: "Bateman killing Allen and the escort girls, that's fabulous, that's rich. What's funny is that I've had endless conversations with people who know that I wrote this script saying "So, me and my friends were arguing, cause I know it was all a dream", or "I know it really happened". Bateman also is seen trying to keep himself young and good looking, as perfectly shown in the opening monologue scene. However, nowhere in either the film or the novel is the exact nature of Bateman's job explained, nor do we ever see him actually doing any work.According to Mary Harron on her DVD commentary, the lack of specifics and failure to identify his exact role are thematically important and offer a commentary on Bateman's psychological state; [official site archived here] By treating the book as raw material for an exuberantly perverse exercise in '80s nostalgia, she recasts the go-go years as a template for the casually brainwashing-consumer/fashion/image culture that emerged from them. However, it quickly emerged that Bruce's initiative, which according to booksellers, was in no way successful, had not been sanctioned by NOW's board of directors. Edit, In the final scene of the film, after Bateman has confessed to the murders, he confronts his lawyer in a bar and tries to talk to him about it. Is it true some songs were used illegally in the film, and hence couldn't be included on the soundtrack? Is there an online sequel to the novel/film? Bateman is approached by an older woman (called Mrs. Wolfe in the novel and the film credits; played by Patricia Gage), presumably a real estate agent, who inquires if he saw the advertisement in The New York Times. They're like having in-class notes for every discussion!, This is absolutely THE best teacher resource I have ever purchased. Edit, There is very little difference between the two versions of the film. Additionally, the frequent mention of videotapes (as opposed to DVDs) helps to date the story. Clearly, this is preparation for what is to come. Teach your students to analyze literature like LitCharts does. Now Carnes, listen, listen very very carefully. The fact that Bateman is never caught and that no one believes his confession just reinforces the shallowness, self-absorption, and lack of morality that they all have. Throughout the book we hear of his countless sick and demented actions of him cooking his victims flesh, and having sexual intercourse with his victims bodies, and various body parts. It's not clear what Bateman is planning to do with the coat-hanger, but it's probably not anything good. Edit, Mistaken identity is a major theme in both the film and the novel, and some fans argue that it is in the recurring cases of mistaken identity wherein lies the true meaning of the film.In the novel, the phrase "someone who looked exactly like" or variations thereof, occur continuously; time and again Bateman encounters people who may or may not be the person he thinks they are. Stop. Such as Rule/Law Breaking, Excessive Lying, Remorselessness, Impulsive Behavior, etc. It is curious to wonder what he suffers from and how it plays into his character and why it drives him to do what he does.It is never made clear as to what Patrick Bateman's illness is, or if he even has one. Having split up with Carruthers, she got involved with Timothy Price (Timothy Price is called Timothy Bryce in the film where he is played by Justin Theroux), but the relationship never went anywhere and she left New York. My nightly bloodlust has overflown into my days. "Kimball: "Well, there's a message on his - answering machine? American Psycho 's ending explained that the specific timeline of events is crucial to understanding the finale. When he tells the Chinese woman at the drycleaners that he will kill her, she doesn't seem to fully understand him, although she does react slightly to his threat. Bateman then shoots the woman instead, letting the cat go. How can Harold Carnes have had lunch with Paul Allen in London when Allen is already dead? Is there any explicit violence toward animals shown in this movie? She just wants that association or anyone who might know anything about it to be away from the apartment so she can sell it. Bateman, appearing very disturbed and confused, begins to leave, and when Wolfe tells him not to come back, he assures her that he has no intention of doing so.As with the Carnes conversation and the issue of Bateman's outbursts, there are two main theories on this scene. The greed of real estates agencies is shown to be no better or worse than that of stock brokers; the materialistic, hedonistic, surface-obsessed world in which they live has shaped their outlooks and their goals, and they have become as much a cause as a product of the problems in their society. This functions as part of the film's critique of 80s hedonism - everyone looks alike, no one really knows anyone else, everyone is disconnected; they are all successful and wealthy, they all look great and eat well, they are all cultured and well travelled, but none of them have any kind of individuating characteristics, and none of them take the trouble to really know any of the others. An important aspect of this question is Bateman's destruction of the police car, which explodes after he fires a single shot, causing even himself to look incredulously at his gun; many argue that this incident proves that what is happening is not real, and therefore, nothing that has gone before can be verified as being real either. Refine any search. As outlined above, the society depicted in the film is one of no real interpersonal relationships, no empathy, a society made up of people who care only about themselves and their own ability to accrue massive amounts of wealth and materialistic trophies; the richer you are the better you are. A further example is when Bateman reluctantly attends a U2 concert with Evelyn. Gavin Smith (editor of Film Comment): You can see the film as an extreme comedy of manners, because so much of it is about social status, how people interact, social one upmanship and social anxiety, and a great deal of it is about these transactions that go on between businessmen or between men and women in a rather elevated kind of social world that's removed from day to day reality [] In a way, it's the introduction of the horror element or the element of the serial killer violence into a gentile, polite world, where whatever the underlying sentiments that people have to one another, which, very true to Reaganism, is very cut throat underneath, that's something that there's a real tradition in social satire going back to Molire; there's always the surface politeness and the surface manners and grace, and underneath, the primary kind of human urges, which are usually sexual. Killer looks. He and his male contemporaries are so weak, so shallow; no one looks good, the women don't look good, the men don't look good, no one looks good. This scene is removed entirely from the film.Another major scene from the novel removed from the film, is when Bateman tortures a woman by forcing a Rat into a woman's vagina, and trapping it inside forcing the rat to eat its way out while Bateman chops off her legs with a chainsaw.While there are many more differences between the film and novel. Detailed explanations, analysis, and citation info for every important quote on LitCharts. A half hour later I'm hard again. [from DVD commentary track] The main character, patrick bateman, is glamorously portrayed as a wealthy, standoffish killer suspected to have antisocial personality disorder and possibly dissociative. Some critics objected to that, as how can we misrepresent the world of Wall Street, but it's not meant to be a literal representation of Wall Street. Guinevere Turner: It's almost like we watch Patrick Bateman go from his normal life.
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