Was all the violence and murder and gore in “American Psycho” real, or did it just happen in Patrick Bateman’s head? Some of the stuff seemed pretty clear to be “in his head” stuff being portrayed as real life, like when he randomly said disturbing, violent things, but what else was imagined and not real?
Yes.
Some wasn’t, which was the fun part.
I don’t have any evidence to offer one way or another, but the OP reminds me of the first I saw the film 14 years ago with my girlfriend at the time. I asked the same question of her for quite awhile later that evening, until she finally told me to shut up and go to sleep.
One of my all-time favorite flicks.
I’d tell you more, but I’m kinda of in a hurry - gotta return some videotapes… 
“FEED ME A STRAY CAT”
Seconded. I think 99% of the events were in his head.
In “The Rules Of Attraction”, Ellis has one of the characters as the younger brother of Patrick Bateman (Sean?). There are references to Patrick, but nothing is said about the massive levels of carnage from “American Psycho”. So I’ll put in my vote for “mostly in his head” too.
This. It makes it quite interesting.
Shortly after reading American Psycho I ended up reading Less Than Zero in one sitting while waiting for the world’s tardiest friend. With both books filling my head, I felt pretty disturbed myself for a day or two. I’m 95% sure I didn’t kill anyone, though!
I’ve heard that the director of the movie, Mary Harron, says that the murders actually do happen in the movie. Not sure about the novel.
I think the movie is intentionally vague and subject to interpretation.
I interpret some of the disturbing things he said in public as the author’s way of indicating that this group of people are so shallow and self-absorbed that they only pretend to be interested in each other.
I always felt like in the book they were in his head, but in the movie they were real.
I thought they were in his head. He did too many suspicious things in front of other people that would have been noticed. I remember one scene where he’s dragging a body across a lobby leaving a trail of blood and I think someone is watching him. In another scene he is stuffing a body wrapped in a rug into a trunk and his friends approach him. (It was a while since I last saw the movie, so I may be incorrect about the details. But I remember those incidents being what convinced me it it was in his head.)
Isn’t there a scene in the movie where Bateman hides a bloody body in a closet in an empty condo in his building, and then has to try to get rid of it before a realtor shows the condo, and then finds that the body is missing? And then the realtor gets there with her client, and glares at Bateman, and we’re meant to wonder whether she’s glaring at him because she had to clean up the body for him, or just because he’s not supposed to be in the empty condo when she’s showing it?
I think we’re meant to wonder why not only does Bateman not get caught but also why we never hear anything about his killings on the news.
This is like the textbook example of the “Death of the Author” theory. There is nothing on screen indicating that what’s happening is real (except, possibly, for the realtor at the end) and dozens of examples of scenes that prove its all in his head.
In addition to the ones that filmore mentions, Bateman blows up a squad of police cars at the end (with a revolver, if I remember right) and the remaining officers that are pursuing him just give up even though they have him cornered.
I’m of the opinion that most of it is actually taking place inside Bruce Wayne’s head.
I don’t get the people who subscribe to the “it was all a dream” interpretation. If you take the interpretation that most or all of it is real, American Psycho is a stunning indictment of a society so depraved and venal that it can allow for a Patrick Bateman to exist and a funhouse mirror look at the 80’s America and the perverse nature of many of it’s promises. If you interpret it as a dream sequence, then it’s a soporific journey into the mind of an insane person.
To me, the key scene has always been the real estate agent. My reading of implied backstory of the scene, in both the book and the movie, is that, after a few weeks of non-communication, some real estate person would have gone up to Paul Allen/Owen’s apartment to check up on him and found the crazy serial killer meat locker that Patrick Batemen established there. When confronted with this, instead of reporting it to the police and risking a massive drop in property value, they instead see a business opportunity and become complicit in the crime. They dispose of all the bodies, clean everything up and put the place up for sale.
There’s a moment where Mrs Wolfe, the real estate agent realizes she’s staring into the eyes of a depraved serial killer and stares him down stone cold and it’s an exquisite scene. No matter how much of a psycho Patrick Bateman is, at that moment, he can’t help to match the degree of depravity that Mrs Wolfe is involved in and he quietly slinks away.
To me, the message of American Psycho is that Patrick Bateman is not the Psycho, it’s that everyone else in society is that and that Patrick might be the only sane man left. Faced with a society that is oppressively post-moral and crushing of individuality, what choice does Bateman have left to make but to try and define himself through the ultimate act of rebellion. What makes the story a twisted tragedy is that, at the end, Bateman makes the realization that even serial killing makes no impact on the people around him and he accepts the same fate as his peers and gives up on his quest to stand out.
This interpretation only works if you accept that most of it was real and for that reason alone, I can’t even countenance arguments that it was mostly in his head.
I am baffled at the theory that the killings it could be real. The strongest evidence is the cop scene and then there’s another scene where he runs in to a building all bloody and the guard does nothing. Doesn’t seem to notice. (It also has been a while since I saw it and I could be misremembering.)
My personal theory is that the first killing was real. And he liked it so much he fantasized about further killings and general mayhem. And that the vapid society of the 80s was so self absorbed that they wouldn’t notice if he killed a bunch of people — or didn’t kill a bunch of people. It’s all the same
Yeah, that’s in the book, too. And it’s a hell of a lot more brutal in that form. The book makes the film look like family viewing.
That’s not Bruce Wayne, that’s Dubs Guy. You may also call him Patrick Batman.
Yes, I liked that idea too. I never quite decided on whether the strangeness in that encounter was because she had just disposed of some horribly mutilated bodies and cleaned up a lot of blood, or if it was Bateman’s own guilty paranoia. I think the hints (such as the obvious clean-up job) lean me towards the interpretation that those murders were real, or at least he did something in Owen’s apartment. The estate agent is suspicious and somewhat hostile towards him.
On the other hand, Bateman’s attorney assures him that Owen cannot be dead. In which case, why is the apartment for sale, anyway? Perhaps the attorney is helping to cover up Bateman’s murders, but the way he talks to him doesn’t imply he thinks he’s a murderous psychopath.
We also have the ridiculous events that just seem like a narcissistic psychopath’s fantasies. The police car that randomly explodes in Bateman’s own action hero moment, and the ease with which he seems to be able to get away with unplanned, half-crazed killings, in public and in his apartment. Hence the “perhaps something” in Owen’s apartment. Maybe he just went crazy, breaking stuff and smearing shit on the walls in an insane “fuck you Paul Owen” moment. Perhaps he’s just a pathetic minor criminal driven by hatred and envy to do something, but without the balls to take it too far (as the attorney said at the end). Bateman just inflates it all in his head so he can feel more powerful and in control than he really is.
I definitely read the OP as
I think I need to rewatch it.
eta: American Psycho 2 makes baby Jesus cry. And not in the good way.
Both Mary Harron (the director) and Guinevere Turner (the screenwriter) have talked about how they made a mistake with editing the film to push people into thinking it might be imagined:
But I have a question for people who subscribe to the “it was all a dream” interpretation of the movie; what do you get out of the movie? What do you see the movie as? What’s interesting about it? Why does it still endure in your imagination? I don’t understand how American Psycho can have heft if it’s just inside someone’s head.
I think its all in the head of Huey Lewis.