p e n g u i n d e v i l

I read the novel last week for my book group and so tonight some of us got together and sat down for the film, American Psycho. I know, didn’t we just watch it? Well, that was two years back and having read the book now, I have some different notions. The first time through I remember getting the idea that the story was a blend of reality and ol’ Pat Bateman’s sick and twisted fantasies. I kept this recollection when reading the book, which made it seem all the more obvious. With this re-watching, I’m not so sure why I originally came away with that idea. Regardless, that is neither here nor there. As a book-to-movie transition I did notice some other things. While the first time through, the movie seemed fairly explicit (with violence and sexuality), after reading the book it seemed positively mild. Maybe I watched an edited version of the film this time?

It is hard to talk about the movie without talking about how it differs from the book and, while those differences do make it lesser (in so many ways) then the novel, it actually does stand on its own as a movie. After reading the book, the relentless barrage and repetition of detail is hard to do without, and I almost sort of missed the guy and his mental processes, but they throw in enough to give you the idea. American Psycho is the story of Pat Bateman, a wall-streeter who is up to watching a lot of porno and killing people when he’s not busy cataloging what people are wearing in his many daily restaurant visits, all while losing his mind in a very misanthropic fashion. He and his “friends” are a shallow and irritating bunch of young rich slicks in Manhattan during the late 1980’s. They spend their time doing coke and gossiping and bragging and through it all there’s Pat! Pat Bateman keeps trying to tell people what he is up to, because he can’t resist hookers and killing them, and killing bums and killing whoever he feels the inclination to kill. It is sort of a harsh and remorseless movie (though, again, no where near as, oh, obscene as the book) which I think is a critique of modern culture, but whatever.

mirror for me

chainsaw for you

Christian Bale does an excellent job as Bateman, and it is an entertaining movie. No matter how terrible and unlikable Pat is, watching him go about his business is fun, it’s just got a lot (and I mean a lot) less bloodshed and insane meanderings, but they stick to the story pretty well. They did a good job with the 1980’s styles and the weaselly personalities… Bateman’s smarmy attitude is sickly sweet, and it’s not like you care about any of the characters that pop up anyway.

And something else I am surprised about. As a Mac user, I remember the days when lazy webber’s would lock out Mac users from their websites. A habit that I found annoying since only rarely is there some reason a Mac wouldn’t be able to use a website (something ActiveX, maybe), I think people wanted to limit what they had to support (though when was the last time a website gave you browser support, anyway?) or else because Microsoft paid them to (something that they’ve certainly done in the past). Just knowing that the platform distinction was usually meaningless always irked me when people would intentionally lock mac users out. I seem to remember some Disney (or something) site some years back that would lock Mac users out for no reason, and I’ve seen some banks that try it. Of course, there are always ways around it and like to go in anyway, just to prove a point. But at this point, I had thought that people didn’t do that anymore, I guess they do! Today I came across a site that pulled that dirty trick again! “Unsupported Operating System, my toches!”. I spoofed through anyway, just to remind myself how annoying those pointless biases are. But I just had to complain, as it seems like a lazy tactic and I do find it irritating.