I was also sad they cut out the dinner reservation conference call where they're still trying to decide at 3am and Bateman is eating fistfuls of cereal out of the box
I enjoyed the rat saga. Overall the movie does a good job of capturing the mentality of Bateman, the madness, the hypermaterialistic superficiality of the culture. I especially like the scene when he returns to the apartment; it captured the tone from the book very well. Bale was immaculate in his portrayal. I really just wish there were an extra 15-20 minutes of the insane things Bateman did on the side and some of the lesser scenes. Maybe more Bryce. Maybe a scene with "like a Prayer" playing like at the end of the book.
I used to love the movie until I read the book and liked the book more. I read it years ago but I remember a part where he meets with the only girl that ever dumped him in a cafe and he starts saying a poem about murdering a Black person in an alley and everyone is staring at him. Then he murders her and literally skull fricks her. Reading Interview With The vampire also ruined the movie for me but reading The Shining made me like the movie version more. Making this post a little too long for this anon.
Generally the books from which the film was adapted from are better, 99 out of 100 times. There is simply too many details a film has to leave out the book doesn't.
not in this case. The book is absolutely boring. Even the author said it was on purpose to show how boring Bateman's life is. That said, he is a truly an evil unredeemable monster in the book. Far more evil than what he was in the movie.
The book being boring at times works though, the crazy detail on mundane objects lulls the reader into a state of normalcy before it being stripped away by Bateman
Probably the biggest difference is just how much longer and more violent the book is. The book is what, 20 hours to read vs an under 2 hour movie. And the torture scenes are horrifying, I mean I've watched a lot of crazy liveleak stuff but the scenes he describes are completely nuts. The drawings at the end of the movie in his notebook actually reference stuff he did in the book if you look closely, but that's as much as a mainstream movie could show obviously, just quick drawings.
The stuff I feel the movie is lacking is the surrealism, there's a bit like FEED ME A STRAY CAT but the stuff like him watching a tv show where a Cheerio is being interviewed really feel like they should have been included. Also the fact that his favorite movie is Shemale Reformatory, or the argument about Trump's favorite pizza.
the movie is a better black comedy, the novel is a better horror
for me the most genuinely horrifying part is when he stabs the toddler at the zoo, the least graphically described murder by far but it's fricking chilling
the movie is a better black comedy, the novel is a better horror
for me the most genuinely horrifying part is when he stabs the toddler at the zoo, the least graphically described murder by far but it's fricking chilling
Nailed it. There's also a ton more "I have to return some video tapes" type moments in the book that would have translated well on film. Like him constantly reciting headlines from the morning talk show he watches when he gets trapped in conversation with people and his autistic obsession with hifi equipment (muh macintosh tube amplifier lmao).
The murders in the movie were done perfectly imo though, like the homeless guy murder and stomping out the dog is enough to get the point across. The book goes full moron and iirc describes him mutilate him heavily, call him a homosexual, and stab and gut the dog. (maybe that was a different murder idk, the book has way more than the film)
>one of the only books that made me feel nauseous reading it
this
I can read blood meridian. and the road. and tons of ww2 horror story memoirs. and watch liveleak violence like anybody else. never bothers me. as long as its interesting because it happened. isis executions were kino.
but the book. I had to put it down a few times. never done that before.
I think its because its for people who like horror movies and those weirdos like the torture and violence and all that as sensationalism.
the book was ok.
the movie was much better. it stated what it was about better than the book. and it wasnt 600 pages of describing materialism and torture. book wasnt that great.
but thats what people into horror movies like. and you fricking weirdos love those torture porn movies I cant even stand.
so of course they love some degenerate homosexual talking about torture for pages on end.
>that being said the movie would have been better with bale standing over his gf foaming at the mouth with an icepick in his hand and then going out onto the beach and eating fistfuls of sand.
I’m the complete opposite, interestingly. Can read/watch/play all manner of violence and degeneracy and be entertained at best or amused at worst but when things are “real” (visually I mean: gore vids etc.) I’m spectacularly affected. The WWII diaries would be the exception, I’m rarely shaken up for long over text based things with some exceptions, the toolbox murders for example. Guess we’re all wired a bit different
Nailed it. There's also a ton more "I have to return some video tapes" type moments in the book that would have translated well on film. Like him constantly reciting headlines from the morning talk show he watches when he gets trapped in conversation with people and his autistic obsession with hifi equipment (muh macintosh tube amplifier lmao).
The murders in the movie were done perfectly imo though, like the homeless guy murder and stomping out the dog is enough to get the point across. The book goes full moron and iirc describes him mutilate him heavily, call him a homosexual, and stab and gut the dog. (maybe that was a different murder idk, the book has way more than the film)
I enjoyed the rat saga. Overall the movie does a good job of capturing the mentality of Bateman, the madness, the hypermaterialistic superficiality of the culture. I especially like the scene when he returns to the apartment; it captured the tone from the book very well. Bale was immaculate in his portrayal. I really just wish there were an extra 15-20 minutes of the insane things Bateman did on the side and some of the lesser scenes. Maybe more Bryce. Maybe a scene with "like a Prayer" playing like at the end of the book.
He goes to a U2 concert in the book and he claims he's feuding with Bono from the front row. He also goes into an elevator and an up and coming actor by the name of Tom Cruise is there.
The book is better.
the movie is a better black comedy, the novel is a better horror
for me the most genuinely horrifying part is when he stabs the toddler at the zoo, the least graphically described murder by far but it's fricking chilling
The scene where he murders a kid at the zoo in front of his mother is truly horrifying.
I thought the book was a non-stop comedy, interrupted by moments of ghastly violence. Every scene is so absurd, from him obsessing over everything everyone wears, to him embarrassing himself in regular interactions with people, having mental breakdowns in restaurants, or prank-calling people telling them he knows where they live and he's gonna come murder them until one laughs playfully at his threats and this shocks him to his core and he spends the rest of the day depressed. Everything about the inside of this guy's head is fricked-up.
He goes to a U2 concert in the book and he claims he's feuding with Bono from the front row. He also goes into an elevator and an up and coming actor by the name of Tom Cruise is there.
The book is better in every regard. The humor, the supericiality, the vivid pov sex scenes, the racism designed to make his ex uncomfortable, the existential dread. So many memorable moments. Love the part where his coworker is at the club (possibly just after the bit where he's doing the rastafarian impression) and just runs down this empty trainline never to be seen again.
God he's such a dweeb in that club scene, it's great >I stick out my hand at a crooked angle, trying to mimic a rapper. “Hey,” I say. “I’m fresh. The freshest, y’know … like, uh, def … the deffest.” I take a sip of champagne. “You know … def.” >To prove this I spot a black guy with dreadlocks and I walk up to him and exclaim “Rasta Man!” and hold out my hand, anticipating a high-five. But the Black person just stands there. >“I mean”—I cough—“Mon,” and then, with less enthusiasm, “We be, uh, jamming.…”
My favorite part in the book is where he steals the helicopter and crashes it into the toy store and the propellers chop everyone up and he starts comparing the blood splatter to a Jackson Pollock painting.
>After the office I worked out at Xclusive and once home made obscene phone calls to young Dalton girls, the numbers I chose coming from the register I stole a copy of from the administration office when I broke in last Thursday night. "I'm a corporate raider," I whispered lasciviously into the cordless phone. "I orchestrate hostile takeovers. What do you think of that?" and I would pause before making sucking noises, freakish piglike grunts, and then ask, "Huh, b***h?" Most of the time I could tell they were frightened and this pleased me greatly, enabled me to maintain a strong, pulsing erection for the duration of the phone calls, until one of the girls, Hillary Wallace, asked, unfazed, "Dad, is that you?" and whatever enthusiasm I'd built up plummeted.
>Loosening my suspenders, ignoring beggars, beggars ignoring me, sweat-drenched, delirious, I find myself back downtown in Tower Records and I compose myself, muttering over and over to no one, "I've gotta return my videotapes, I've gotta return my videotapes," and I buy two copies of my favorite compact disc, Bruce Willis, The Return of Bruno, and then I'm stuck in the revolving door for five full spins and I trip out onto the street, bumping into Charles Murphy from Kidder Peabody or it could be Bruce Barker from Morgan Stanley, whoever, and he says "Hey, Kinsley" and I belch into his face, my eyes rolling back into my head, greenish bile dripping in strings from my bared fangs, and he suggests, unfazed, "See you at Fluties, okay? Severt too?"
(cont.)
>I screech and while backing away I bump into a fruit stand at a Korean deli, collapsing stacks of apples and oranges and lemons, that go rolling onto the sidewalk, over the curb and into the street where they're splattered by cabs and cars and buses and trucks and I'm apologizing, delirious, offering a screaming Korean my platinum AmEx accidentally, then a twenty, which he immediately takes, but still he grabs me by the lapels of the stained, wrinkled jacket I've forced myself back into and when I look up into his slanty-eyed round face he suddenly bursts into the chorus of Lou Christie's "Lightnin' Strikes." I pull away, horrified, stumbling uptown, toward home, but people, places, stores keep interrupting me, a drug, dealer on Thirteenth Street who offers me crack and blindly I wave a fifty at him and he says "Oh, man" gratefully and shakes my hand, pressing five vials into my palm which I proceed to eat whole and the crack dealer stares at me, trying to mask his deep disturbance with an amused glare, and I grab him by the neck and croak out, my breath reeking, "The best engine is in the BMW 750iL," and then I move on to a phone booth, where I babble gibberish at the operator until I finally spit out my credit card number and then I'm speaking to the front office of Xclusive, where I cancel a massage appointment that I never made.
(cont.)
>I'm able to compose myself by simply staring at my feet, kicking pigeons aside, and without even noticing, I enter a delicatessen on Second Avenue and I'm still confused, mixed up, sweaty, and I walk over to a short, fat israeli woman, old and hideously dressed. "Listen," I say. "I have a reservation. Bateman. Where's the maître d? I know Jackie Mason," and she sighs, "I can seat you. Don't need a reservation," as she reaches for a menu. She leads me to a horrible table in back near the restrooms and I grab the menu away from her and rush to a booth up front and I'm appalled by the cheapness of the food – "Is this a goddamn joke?" – and sensing a waitress is near I order without looking up. "A cheeseburger. I'd like a cheeseburger and I'd like it medium rare." "I'm sorry, sir," the waitress says. "No cheese. Kosher," and I have no idea what the frick she's talking about and I say, "Fine. A kosherburger but with cheese, Monterey Jack perhaps, and – oh god," I moan, sensing more cramps coming on. "No cheese, sir," she says. "Kosher..." "Oh god, is this a nightmare, you fricking israelite?" I mutter, and then, "Cottage cheese? Just bring it?" "I'll get the manager," she says. "Whatever. But bring me a beverage in the meanwhile," I hiss. "Yes?" she asks. "A... vanilla... milk shake..." "No milk shakes. Kosher," she says, then, "I'll get the manager." "No, wait." "Mister I'll get the manager." "What in the frick is going on?" I ask, seething, my platinum AmEx already slapped on the greasy table. "No milk shake. Kosher," she says, thick-upped, just one of billions of people who have passed over this planet. "Then bring me a fricking... vanilla... malted!" I roar, spraying spit all over my open menu. She stares. "Extra thick!" I add. She walks away to get the manager and when I see him approaching, a bald carbon copy of the waitress, I get up and scream, "Frick yourself you moronic wienersucking israelite," and I run out onto the street where this
chapter ends there
The book. The movie is still good but Christian Bale completely carries it and it wouldn't have been good without him in it. The part in the book with Patrick ranting at the israeli restaurant staff is hilarious.
I think the scenes in book are paired in the way that first bateman rants how antisemitism is a huge problem among other things (this scene is in the movie) and then he goes to a kosher restaurant and demands meats or a big mac etc they would obviously not have or sell.
I love the book, but the movie is an incredible feat of an adapted screenplay. Reading through the book, it feels completely unadaptable and it’s remarkable what they were able to achieve.
“Oh, I almost forgot,” I say, reaching into my pocket. “I wrote you a poem.” I hand her the slip of paper. “Here.” I feel sick and broken, tortured, really on the brink. >“Oh Patrick.” She smiles. “How sweet.” >“Well, you know,” I say, looking down shyly. >Bethany takes the slip of paper and unfolds it. >“Read it,” I urge enthusiastically. >She looks it over quizzically, puzzled, squinting, then she turns the page over to see if there’s anything on the back. Something in her understands it’s short and she looks back at the words written, scrawled in red, on the front of the page. >“It’s like haiku, you know?” I say. “Read it. Go on.” >She clears her throat and hesitantly begins reading, slowly, stopping often. “‘The poor Black person on the wall. Look at him.’” She pauses and squints again at the paper, then hesitantly resumes. “‘Look at the poor Black person. Look at the poor Black person … on … the … wall.’” She stops again, faltering, looks at me, confused, then back at the paper. >“Go on,” I say, looking around for a waiter. >“Finish it.” >She clears her throat and staring steadily at the paper tries to read the rest of it in a voice below a whisper. “‘Frick him … Frick the Black person on the wall …’” She falters again, then reads the last sentence, sighing. “‘Black man … is … de … debil?’” >The couple at the next table have slowly turned to gaze over at us. The man looks aghast, the woman has an equally horrified expression on her face. I stare her down, glaring, until she looks back at her fricking salad. >“Well, Patrick,” Bethany says, clearing her throat, trying to smile, handing the paper back to me. >“Yes?” I ask. “Well?” >“I can see that”—she stops, thinking—“that your sense of … social injustice is”—she clears her throat again and looks down—“still intact.” >I take the paper back from her and slip it in my pocket and smile, still trying to keep a straight face, holding my body upright so she won’t suspect me of cringing.
>the scene where he tries to argue that pepsi is better than coke with his date's parents >has a complete nervous breakdown and they ask him if he's ok
He is LITERALLY me
Timothy Price is kind of an interesting character in the novel.
He feels like the alpha dog vapid moron Bateman models himself after the most. Yet at the same time, Price is also the character most willing to call everyone out for their yuppie bullshit. He's this strange nexus of naturally embodying everything the book critiques, yet also being at odds with it.
Some anon said it well that the book is horror and movie is black comedy. Sometimes it works like that. The Mask also did something similar even tho it's more of capeshit territory but, the comic book was horror gore and the movie was a romantic comedy with some horror references here and there.
The book outstays its welcome, but the movie doesn't
Not so much the overextended violence as the overextended everything, the same themes, the same jokes, to the point it kind of beats you over the head with its messaging. the movie isn't "subtle" it's true to that aspect of the novel but it's shorter and refined in a way that makes the book seem superfluous in its excess. I still would recommend the boo
>I collect my mail-Polo catalog, American Express bill, June Playboy, invitation to an office party at a new club called Bedlam-then walk to the elevator, step in while inspecting the Ralph Lauren brochure and press the button for my floor and then the Close Door button, but someone gets in right before the doors shut and instinctively I turn to say hello. >It’s the actor Tom Cruise, who lives in the penthouse, and as a courtesy, without asking him, I press the PH button and he nods thank you and keeps his eyes fixed on the numbers lighting up above the door in rapid succession. He is much shorter in person and he’s wearing the same pair of black Wayfarers I have on. He’s dressed in blue jeans, a white T-shirt, an Armani jacket. To break the noticeably uncomfortable silence, I clear my throat and say, “I thought you were very fine in Bartender. I thought it was quite a good movie, and Top Gun too. I really thought that was good.” >He looks away from the numbers and then straight at me. “It was called wienertail,” he says softly. “Pardon?” I say, confused. >He clears his throat and says, “wienertail. Not Bartender. The film was called wienertail.”
>A long pause follows; just the sound of cables moving the elevator up higher into the building competes with the silence, obvious and heavy between us. “Oh yeah.. Right,” I say, as if the title just dawned on me. “wienertail. Oh yeah, that’s right,” I say. “Great, Bateman, what are you thinking about?” I shake my head as if to clear it and then, to patch things up, hold out my hand. “Hi. Pat Bateman.” >Cruise tentatively shakes it. “So,” I go. “You like living in this building?” >He waits a long time before answering, “I guess.” >“It’s great,” I say. “Isn’t it?” He nods, not looking at me, and I press the button for my floor again, an almost involuntary reaction. We stand there in silence. “So.. wienertail,” I say, after a while. “That’s the name.” >He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t even nod, but now he’s looking at me strangely and he lowers his sunglasses and says, with a slight grimace, “Uh… your nose is bleeding.” >I stand there rock still for a moment, before understanding that I have to do something about this, so I pretend to be suitably embarrassed, quizzically touch my nose then bring out my Polo handkerchief—already spotted brown—and wipe the blood away from my nostrils, overall handling it sort of well. >“Must be the altitude.” I laugh. “We’re up so high.” >He nods, says nothing, looks up at the numbers. >The elevator stops at my floor and when the doors open I tell Tom, “I’m a big fan. It’s really good to finally meet you.” >“Oh yeah, right.” Cruise smiles that famous grin and jabs at the Close Door button.
>"Yale thing?" he asks, confused. >I pause, having no idea what I'm talking about. "Yeah... Yale thing." >"What do you mean... Yale thing?" Now he's intrigued. >I pause again - what do I mean? "Well, I think, for one, that he was probably a closet homosexual." I have no idea; doubt it, considering his taste in babes. "Who did a lot of cocaine...." I pause, then add, a bit shakily, "That Yale thing." I'm sure I say this bizarrely, but there's no other way to put it. >It's very quiet in the office right now. The room suddenly seems cramped and sweltering and even though the air-conditioning is on full blast, the air seems fake, recycled. >"So..." Kimball looks at his book helplessly. "There's nothing you can tell me about Paul Owen?" >"Well." I sigh. "He led what I suppose was an orderly life, I guess." Really stumped, I offer, "He... ate a balanced diet." >I'm sensing frustration on Kimball's part and he asks, "What kind of man was he? Besides" - he falters, tries to smile - "the information you've just given." >How would I describe Paul Owen to this guy? Boasting, arrogant, cheerful dickhead who constantly weaseled his way out of checks at Nell's? That I'm heir to the unfortunate information that his penis had a name and that name was Michael? No. Calmer, Bateman. I think that I'm smiling.
>"Any movies that Jami Gertz is in?" >>"Who?" She enters something into the computer and then says without looking at me, "How many nights?" >"Three," I say. "Don't you know who Jami Gertz is?" >>"I don't think so." She actually sighs. >"Jami Gertz," I say. "She's an actress." >">I don't think I know who you mean," she says in a tone that suggests I'm harassing her, but hey, she works in a video rental store and since it's such a demanding high-powered profession her b***hy behavior is completely reasonable, right? The things I could do to this girl's body with a hammer, the words I could carve into her with an ice pick. She hands the guy behind her my boxes - and I pretend to ignore his horrified reaction as he recognizes me after he looks at the Body Double box - but he dutifully walks into some kind of vault in the back of the store to get the movies. >"Yeah. Sure you do," I say good-naturedly. "She's in those Diet Coke commercials. You know the ones." >>"I really don't think so," she says in a monotone that almost cuts me off. She types the names of the movies and then my membership number into the computer. >"I like the part in Body Double where the woman... gets drilled by the... power driller in the movie... the best," I say, almost gasping. It seems very hot in the video store right now all of a sudden and after murmuring "oh my god" under my breath I place a gloved hand on the counter to settle it from shaking. "And the blood starts pouring out of the ceiling." I take a deep breath and while I'm saying this my head starts nodding of its own accord and I keep swallowing, thinking I have to see her shoes, and so as inconspicuously as possible I try to peer over the counter to check out what kind of shoes she's wearing, but maddeningly they're only sneakers - not K-Swiss, not Tretorn, not Adidas, not Reebok, just cheap ones.
>Earlier, there was so much of Bethany's blood pooled on the floor that I could make out my reflection in it while I reached for one of my cordless phones, and I watched myself make a haircut appointment at Gio's. >Back at my place I stand over Bethany's body, sipping a drink contemplatively, studying its condition. Both eyelids are open halfway and her lower teeth look as if they're just jutting out since her lips have been torn - actually bitten - off. Earlier in the day I had sawed off her left arm, which is what finally killed her, and right now I pick it up, holding it by the bone that protrudes from where her hand used to be (I have no idea where it is now: the freezer? the closet?), clenching it in my fist like a pipe, flesh and muscle still clinging to it though a lot of it has been hacked or gnawed off, and I bring it down on her head. It takes very few blows, five or six at most, to smash her jaw open completely, and only two more for her face to cave in on itself.
IMO the book has funnier moments like when he's sexually harassing random callers and one of the callers thinks it's her dad and it kills Batemans mood.
I think they're both on the same level, in different ways
The book obviously has way more detail and in-depth exploration of Patrick Bateman's character and psychology, and there's a whole lot of truly fricked up moments you'd never get away with doing in a film, and in a lot of places it's genuinely fricking funny. But it also suffers from the (100% intentional) repetition and boredom. Patrick does the same things over and over again, he worries and breaks down over and over, he does a bit of the old ultraviolence again and again, and there's the endless lists of what brands the characters are wearing or what tech they've got that you just end up skimming over. It's tiring and boring in places, deliberately so. The plot doesn't even get going until halfway through the book. I understand what BEE was going for there in aiming to desensitize the reader to both the violence and the 80s yuppie life, but regardless of intention, it does just wear you down.
The film is an incredibly effective adaptation. It condenses the book to its essential parts, and in a lot of scenes dialogue is taken directly from the page, while still retaining enough of the repetition and monotony to get the same point about desensitisation across to the audience. The cast is also fantastic; obviously there's Christian Bale carrying the whole film, but then the supporting actors (particularly Leto, Dafoe, Witherspoon) are also really good in their roles, and it keeps the humour of the book well. However, the film doesn't get everything. The murders and crimes aren't as horrifically fricked up, and the lack of Patrick's narration/stream of consciousness means that certain elements are lost. It doesn't really show just how stupid Patrick clearly is despite thinking he's a super intelligent psycho, so the constant comedy there is lost, and the film doesn't lean into the unreliable narrator aspect until the very end, which is the biggest negative for me.
my final thesis at college was a Lacanian psychoanalysis of Bateman's motivations and self-image and thinking about it still makes me cringe into a small raisin
>I recommend Ellis' book
if this sentence doesn't end with American Psycho it is a lie, everything else is objectively absolute garbage
ESPECIALLY Less Than Zero
The book had the urinal cake bit so that's better automatically.
I was also sad they cut out the dinner reservation conference call where they're still trying to decide at 3am and Bateman is eating fistfuls of cereal out of the box
Oh what I would do to have this part of the book inserted into the movie...
I enjoyed the rat saga. Overall the movie does a good job of capturing the mentality of Bateman, the madness, the hypermaterialistic superficiality of the culture. I especially like the scene when he returns to the apartment; it captured the tone from the book very well. Bale was immaculate in his portrayal. I really just wish there were an extra 15-20 minutes of the insane things Bateman did on the side and some of the lesser scenes. Maybe more Bryce. Maybe a scene with "like a Prayer" playing like at the end of the book.
I don't read books(or even posts longer than a few sentences) but it has to be better because the movie was directed by a woman.
I used to love the movie until I read the book and liked the book more. I read it years ago but I remember a part where he meets with the only girl that ever dumped him in a cafe and he starts saying a poem about murdering a Black person in an alley and everyone is staring at him. Then he murders her and literally skull fricks her. Reading Interview With The vampire also ruined the movie for me but reading The Shining made me like the movie version more. Making this post a little too long for this anon.
The end of your post made me laugh a lot
Generally the books from which the film was adapted from are better, 99 out of 100 times. There is simply too many details a film has to leave out the book doesn't.
not in this case. The book is absolutely boring. Even the author said it was on purpose to show how boring Bateman's life is. That said, he is a truly an evil unredeemable monster in the book. Far more evil than what he was in the movie.
The book being boring at times works though, the crazy detail on mundane objects lulls the reader into a state of normalcy before it being stripped away by Bateman
Yeah but like in the film, it’s ambiguous whether or not he’s actually killing anyone.
Book
Rare instance in which both are great in their respective format. The movie knew what to change and what to keep.
Does not connecting with people make you a psycho or do psychos just not connect?
the trick is to be so handsome and charming it doesn't matter, dork
Don Draper ass mf
I've never read the book, but I'm going to go ahead and say the movie was better.
Probably the biggest difference is just how much longer and more violent the book is. The book is what, 20 hours to read vs an under 2 hour movie. And the torture scenes are horrifying, I mean I've watched a lot of crazy liveleak stuff but the scenes he describes are completely nuts. The drawings at the end of the movie in his notebook actually reference stuff he did in the book if you look closely, but that's as much as a mainstream movie could show obviously, just quick drawings.
The stuff I feel the movie is lacking is the surrealism, there's a bit like FEED ME A STRAY CAT but the stuff like him watching a tv show where a Cheerio is being interviewed really feel like they should have been included. Also the fact that his favorite movie is Shemale Reformatory, or the argument about Trump's favorite pizza.
I wish the movie was an hour longer at least.
The scene where he murders a kid at the zoo in front of his mother is truly horrifying.
zoochildmurdermind
the movie is a better black comedy, the novel is a better horror
for me the most genuinely horrifying part is when he stabs the toddler at the zoo, the least graphically described murder by far but it's fricking chilling
Nailed it. There's also a ton more "I have to return some video tapes" type moments in the book that would have translated well on film. Like him constantly reciting headlines from the morning talk show he watches when he gets trapped in conversation with people and his autistic obsession with hifi equipment (muh macintosh tube amplifier lmao).
The murders in the movie were done perfectly imo though, like the homeless guy murder and stomping out the dog is enough to get the point across. The book goes full moron and iirc describes him mutilate him heavily, call him a homosexual, and stab and gut the dog. (maybe that was a different murder idk, the book has way more than the film)
I think the homeless man and dog actually survive in the book but the man is blinded.
one of the only books that made me feel nauseous reading it. Not just the violence but the depiction of psychosis. He is way more crazy in the book
>one of the only books that made me feel nauseous reading it
this
I can read blood meridian. and the road. and tons of ww2 horror story memoirs. and watch liveleak violence like anybody else. never bothers me. as long as its interesting because it happened. isis executions were kino.
but the book. I had to put it down a few times. never done that before.
I think its because its for people who like horror movies and those weirdos like the torture and violence and all that as sensationalism.
the book was ok.
the movie was much better. it stated what it was about better than the book. and it wasnt 600 pages of describing materialism and torture. book wasnt that great.
but thats what people into horror movies like. and you fricking weirdos love those torture porn movies I cant even stand.
so of course they love some degenerate homosexual talking about torture for pages on end.
>that being said the movie would have been better with bale standing over his gf foaming at the mouth with an icepick in his hand and then going out onto the beach and eating fistfuls of sand.
I’m the complete opposite, interestingly. Can read/watch/play all manner of violence and degeneracy and be entertained at best or amused at worst but when things are “real” (visually I mean: gore vids etc.) I’m spectacularly affected. The WWII diaries would be the exception, I’m rarely shaken up for long over text based things with some exceptions, the toolbox murders for example. Guess we’re all wired a bit different
the movie is peak dark comedy
so is the book. A park seat literally talks to him and bateman imagines it following him.
That's not funny.
yea it is
Bigfoot was interviewed on The Patty Winters Show this morning and to my shock I found him surprisingly articulate and charming.
You're making this book sound completely awful.
I don’t give a frick what you think, butthole. My happiness is not determined on whether or not you read a particular novel.
Who said it was? You're just really making this sound terrible.
>t. Doesn’t have any videotapes to return.
and you sound like a homosexual
and you sound like a big homosexual
The movie was a dark comedy with some horror elements, the book was horror with some dark comedy sprinkled throughout
I thought the book was a non-stop comedy, interrupted by moments of ghastly violence. Every scene is so absurd, from him obsessing over everything everyone wears, to him embarrassing himself in regular interactions with people, having mental breakdowns in restaurants, or prank-calling people telling them he knows where they live and he's gonna come murder them until one laughs playfully at his threats and this shocks him to his core and he spends the rest of the day depressed. Everything about the inside of this guy's head is fricked-up.
Bro, the book is a nonstop tongue in cheek comedy smut fest, what horror are you talking about?
Changing from Genesis/Phil Collins to Huey Lewis really didn't make sense.
The book because the movie doesn't have the U2 concert.
I am the devil and I AM LIKE YOU
the book is unfilmable
He goes to a U2 concert in the book and he claims he's feuding with Bono from the front row. He also goes into an elevator and an up and coming actor by the name of Tom Cruise is there.
The book is better.
>I really loved your new movie Bartender
The book is definitely more insane. Reading it made me appreciate the movie a lot more since I realized what a great adaptation it is.
Both are incredibly gay
The book is pretentious shit
the film at least had bale to carry it
What's the pretense?
the sequal, obviously
The book is better in every regard. The humor, the supericiality, the vivid pov sex scenes, the racism designed to make his ex uncomfortable, the existential dread. So many memorable moments. Love the part where his coworker is at the club (possibly just after the bit where he's doing the rastafarian impression) and just runs down this empty trainline never to be seen again.
God he's such a dweeb in that club scene, it's great
>I stick out my hand at a crooked angle, trying to mimic a rapper. “Hey,” I say. “I’m fresh. The freshest, y’know … like, uh, def … the deffest.” I take a sip of champagne. “You know … def.”
>To prove this I spot a black guy with dreadlocks and I walk up to him and exclaim “Rasta Man!” and hold out my hand, anticipating a high-five. But the Black person just stands there.
>“I mean”—I cough—“Mon,” and then, with less enthusiasm, “We be, uh, jamming.…”
For me it’s his dinner companions listing off notable vacation points of interest straight out of a travel guide.
My favorite part in the book is where he steals the helicopter and crashes it into the toy store and the propellers chop everyone up and he starts comparing the blood splatter to a Jackson Pollock painting.
>After the office I worked out at Xclusive and once home made obscene phone calls to young Dalton girls, the numbers I chose coming from the register I stole a copy of from the administration office when I broke in last Thursday night. "I'm a corporate raider," I whispered lasciviously into the cordless phone. "I orchestrate hostile takeovers. What do you think of that?" and I would pause before making sucking noises, freakish piglike grunts, and then ask, "Huh, b***h?" Most of the time I could tell they were frightened and this pleased me greatly, enabled me to maintain a strong, pulsing erection for the duration of the phone calls, until one of the girls, Hillary Wallace, asked, unfazed, "Dad, is that you?" and whatever enthusiasm I'd built up plummeted.
>Loosening my suspenders, ignoring beggars, beggars ignoring me, sweat-drenched, delirious, I find myself back downtown in Tower Records and I compose myself, muttering over and over to no one, "I've gotta return my videotapes, I've gotta return my videotapes," and I buy two copies of my favorite compact disc, Bruce Willis, The Return of Bruno, and then I'm stuck in the revolving door for five full spins and I trip out onto the street, bumping into Charles Murphy from Kidder Peabody or it could be Bruce Barker from Morgan Stanley, whoever, and he says "Hey, Kinsley" and I belch into his face, my eyes rolling back into my head, greenish bile dripping in strings from my bared fangs, and he suggests, unfazed, "See you at Fluties, okay? Severt too?"
(cont.)
>I screech and while backing away I bump into a fruit stand at a Korean deli, collapsing stacks of apples and oranges and lemons, that go rolling onto the sidewalk, over the curb and into the street where they're splattered by cabs and cars and buses and trucks and I'm apologizing, delirious, offering a screaming Korean my platinum AmEx accidentally, then a twenty, which he immediately takes, but still he grabs me by the lapels of the stained, wrinkled jacket I've forced myself back into and when I look up into his slanty-eyed round face he suddenly bursts into the chorus of Lou Christie's "Lightnin' Strikes." I pull away, horrified, stumbling uptown, toward home, but people, places, stores keep interrupting me, a drug, dealer on Thirteenth Street who offers me crack and blindly I wave a fifty at him and he says "Oh, man" gratefully and shakes my hand, pressing five vials into my palm which I proceed to eat whole and the crack dealer stares at me, trying to mask his deep disturbance with an amused glare, and I grab him by the neck and croak out, my breath reeking, "The best engine is in the BMW 750iL," and then I move on to a phone booth, where I babble gibberish at the operator until I finally spit out my credit card number and then I'm speaking to the front office of Xclusive, where I cancel a massage appointment that I never made.
(cont.)
>I'm able to compose myself by simply staring at my feet, kicking pigeons aside, and without even noticing, I enter a delicatessen on Second Avenue and I'm still confused, mixed up, sweaty, and I walk over to a short, fat israeli woman, old and hideously dressed. "Listen," I say. "I have a reservation. Bateman. Where's the maître d? I know Jackie Mason," and she sighs, "I can seat you. Don't need a reservation," as she reaches for a menu. She leads me to a horrible table in back near the restrooms and I grab the menu away from her and rush to a booth up front and I'm appalled by the cheapness of the food – "Is this a goddamn joke?" – and sensing a waitress is near I order without looking up. "A cheeseburger. I'd like a cheeseburger and I'd like it medium rare." "I'm sorry, sir," the waitress says. "No cheese. Kosher," and I have no idea what the frick she's talking about and I say, "Fine. A kosherburger but with cheese, Monterey Jack perhaps, and – oh god," I moan, sensing more cramps coming on. "No cheese, sir," she says. "Kosher..." "Oh god, is this a nightmare, you fricking israelite?" I mutter, and then, "Cottage cheese? Just bring it?" "I'll get the manager," she says. "Whatever. But bring me a beverage in the meanwhile," I hiss. "Yes?" she asks. "A... vanilla... milk shake..." "No milk shakes. Kosher," she says, then, "I'll get the manager." "No, wait." "Mister I'll get the manager." "What in the frick is going on?" I ask, seething, my platinum AmEx already slapped on the greasy table. "No milk shake. Kosher," she says, thick-upped, just one of billions of people who have passed over this planet. "Then bring me a fricking... vanilla... malted!" I roar, spraying spit all over my open menu. She stares. "Extra thick!" I add. She walks away to get the manager and when I see him approaching, a bald carbon copy of the waitress, I get up and scream, "Frick yourself you moronic wienersucking israelite," and I run out onto the street where this
chapter ends there
I like the part where he shovels down fistfulls of ham and then does a huge ham burp in one of his coworkers face and runs away
The book. The movie is still good but Christian Bale completely carries it and it wouldn't have been good without him in it. The part in the book with Patrick ranting at the israeli restaurant staff is hilarious.
I think the scenes in book are paired in the way that first bateman rants how antisemitism is a huge problem among other things (this scene is in the movie) and then he goes to a kosher restaurant and demands meats or a big mac etc they would obviously not have or sell.
I love the book, but the movie is an incredible feat of an adapted screenplay. Reading through the book, it feels completely unadaptable and it’s remarkable what they were able to achieve.
“Oh, I almost forgot,” I say, reaching into my pocket. “I wrote you a poem.” I hand her the slip of paper. “Here.” I feel sick and broken, tortured, really on the brink.
>“Oh Patrick.” She smiles. “How sweet.”
>“Well, you know,” I say, looking down shyly.
>Bethany takes the slip of paper and unfolds it.
>“Read it,” I urge enthusiastically.
>She looks it over quizzically, puzzled, squinting, then she turns the page over to see if there’s anything on the back. Something in her understands it’s short and she looks back at the words written, scrawled in red, on the front of the page.
>“It’s like haiku, you know?” I say. “Read it. Go on.”
>She clears her throat and hesitantly begins reading, slowly, stopping often. “‘The poor Black person on the wall. Look at him.’” She pauses and squints again at the paper, then hesitantly resumes. “‘Look at the poor Black person. Look at the poor Black person … on … the … wall.’” She stops again, faltering, looks at me, confused, then back at the paper.
>“Go on,” I say, looking around for a waiter. >“Finish it.”
>She clears her throat and staring steadily at the paper tries to read the rest of it in a voice below a whisper. “‘Frick him … Frick the Black person on the wall …’” She falters again, then reads the last sentence, sighing. “‘Black man … is … de … debil?’”
>The couple at the next table have slowly turned to gaze over at us. The man looks aghast, the woman has an equally horrified expression on her face. I stare her down, glaring, until she looks back at her fricking salad.
>“Well, Patrick,” Bethany says, clearing her throat, trying to smile, handing the paper back to me.
>“Yes?” I ask. “Well?”
>“I can see that”—she stops, thinking—“that your sense of … social injustice is”—she clears her throat again and looks down—“still intact.”
>I take the paper back from her and slip it in my pocket and smile, still trying to keep a straight face, holding my body upright so she won’t suspect me of cringing.
>the scene where he tries to argue that pepsi is better than coke with his date's parents
>has a complete nervous breakdown and they ask him if he's ok
He is LITERALLY me
Timothy Price is kind of an interesting character in the novel.
He feels like the alpha dog vapid moron Bateman models himself after the most. Yet at the same time, Price is also the character most willing to call everyone out for their yuppie bullshit. He's this strange nexus of naturally embodying everything the book critiques, yet also being at odds with it.
Doesn’t he repent later in the chapter? He visits Bateman with ash on his forehead and quit drinking beer
The book is extreme. The movie is fairly tame.
Some anon said it well that the book is horror and movie is black comedy. Sometimes it works like that. The Mask also did something similar even tho it's more of capeshit territory but, the comic book was horror gore and the movie was a romantic comedy with some horror references here and there.
The book outstays its welcome, but the movie doesn't
Not so much the overextended violence as the overextended everything, the same themes, the same jokes, to the point it kind of beats you over the head with its messaging. the movie isn't "subtle" it's true to that aspect of the novel but it's shorter and refined in a way that makes the book seem superfluous in its excess. I still would recommend the boo
Right is a much better portrait
>I collect my mail-Polo catalog, American Express bill, June Playboy, invitation to an office party at a new club called Bedlam-then walk to the elevator, step in while inspecting the Ralph Lauren brochure and press the button for my floor and then the Close Door button, but someone gets in right before the doors shut and instinctively I turn to say hello.
>It’s the actor Tom Cruise, who lives in the penthouse, and as a courtesy, without asking him, I press the PH button and he nods thank you and keeps his eyes fixed on the numbers lighting up above the door in rapid succession. He is much shorter in person and he’s wearing the same pair of black Wayfarers I have on. He’s dressed in blue jeans, a white T-shirt, an Armani jacket. To break the noticeably uncomfortable silence, I clear my throat and say, “I thought you were very fine in Bartender. I thought it was quite a good movie, and Top Gun too. I really thought that was good.”
>He looks away from the numbers and then straight at me. “It was called wienertail,” he says softly. “Pardon?” I say, confused.
>He clears his throat and says, “wienertail. Not Bartender. The film was called wienertail.”
>A long pause follows; just the sound of cables moving the elevator up higher into the building competes with the silence, obvious and heavy between us. “Oh yeah.. Right,” I say, as if the title just dawned on me. “wienertail. Oh yeah, that’s right,” I say. “Great, Bateman, what are you thinking about?” I shake my head as if to clear it and then, to patch things up, hold out my hand. “Hi. Pat Bateman.”
>Cruise tentatively shakes it. “So,” I go. “You like living in this building?”
>He waits a long time before answering, “I guess.”
>“It’s great,” I say. “Isn’t it?” He nods, not looking at me, and I press the button for my floor again, an almost involuntary reaction. We stand there in silence. “So.. wienertail,” I say, after a while. “That’s the name.”
>He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t even nod, but now he’s looking at me strangely and he lowers his sunglasses and says, with a slight grimace, “Uh… your nose is bleeding.”
>I stand there rock still for a moment, before understanding that I have to do something about this, so I pretend to be suitably embarrassed, quizzically touch my nose then bring out my Polo handkerchief—already spotted brown—and wipe the blood away from my nostrils, overall handling it sort of well.
>“Must be the altitude.” I laugh. “We’re up so high.”
>He nods, says nothing, looks up at the numbers.
>The elevator stops at my floor and when the doors open I tell Tom, “I’m a big fan. It’s really good to finally meet you.”
>“Oh yeah, right.” Cruise smiles that famous grin and jabs at the Close Door button.
I don’t read.
>"Yale thing?" he asks, confused.
>I pause, having no idea what I'm talking about. "Yeah... Yale thing."
>"What do you mean... Yale thing?" Now he's intrigued.
>I pause again - what do I mean? "Well, I think, for one, that he was probably a closet homosexual." I have no idea; doubt it, considering his taste in babes. "Who did a lot of cocaine...." I pause, then add, a bit shakily, "That Yale thing." I'm sure I say this bizarrely, but there's no other way to put it.
>It's very quiet in the office right now. The room suddenly seems cramped and sweltering and even though the air-conditioning is on full blast, the air seems fake, recycled.
>"So..." Kimball looks at his book helplessly. "There's nothing you can tell me about Paul Owen?"
>"Well." I sigh. "He led what I suppose was an orderly life, I guess." Really stumped, I offer, "He... ate a balanced diet."
>I'm sensing frustration on Kimball's part and he asks, "What kind of man was he? Besides" - he falters, tries to smile - "the information you've just given."
>How would I describe Paul Owen to this guy? Boasting, arrogant, cheerful dickhead who constantly weaseled his way out of checks at Nell's? That I'm heir to the unfortunate information that his penis had a name and that name was Michael? No. Calmer, Bateman. I think that I'm smiling.
>"Any movies that Jami Gertz is in?"
>>"Who?" She enters something into the computer and then says without looking at me, "How many nights?"
>"Three," I say. "Don't you know who Jami Gertz is?"
>>"I don't think so." She actually sighs.
>"Jami Gertz," I say. "She's an actress."
>">I don't think I know who you mean," she says in a tone that suggests I'm harassing her, but hey, she works in a video rental store and since it's such a demanding high-powered profession her b***hy behavior is completely reasonable, right? The things I could do to this girl's body with a hammer, the words I could carve into her with an ice pick. She hands the guy behind her my boxes - and I pretend to ignore his horrified reaction as he recognizes me after he looks at the Body Double box - but he dutifully walks into some kind of vault in the back of the store to get the movies.
>"Yeah. Sure you do," I say good-naturedly. "She's in those Diet Coke commercials. You know the ones."
>>"I really don't think so," she says in a monotone that almost cuts me off. She types the names of the movies and then my membership number into the computer.
>"I like the part in Body Double where the woman... gets drilled by the... power driller in the movie... the best," I say, almost gasping. It seems very hot in the video store right now all of a sudden and after murmuring "oh my god" under my breath I place a gloved hand on the counter to settle it from shaking. "And the blood starts pouring out of the ceiling." I take a deep breath and while I'm saying this my head starts nodding of its own accord and I keep swallowing, thinking I have to see her shoes, and so as inconspicuously as possible I try to peer over the counter to check out what kind of shoes she's wearing, but maddeningly they're only sneakers - not K-Swiss, not Tretorn, not Adidas, not Reebok, just cheap ones.
>Earlier, there was so much of Bethany's blood pooled on the floor that I could make out my reflection in it while I reached for one of my cordless phones, and I watched myself make a haircut appointment at Gio's.
>Back at my place I stand over Bethany's body, sipping a drink contemplatively, studying its condition. Both eyelids are open halfway and her lower teeth look as if they're just jutting out since her lips have been torn - actually bitten - off. Earlier in the day I had sawed off her left arm, which is what finally killed her, and right now I pick it up, holding it by the bone that protrudes from where her hand used to be (I have no idea where it is now: the freezer? the closet?), clenching it in my fist like a pipe, flesh and muscle still clinging to it though a lot of it has been hacked or gnawed off, and I bring it down on her head. It takes very few blows, five or six at most, to smash her jaw open completely, and only two more for her face to cave in on itself.
deep.
book is alright, but a turbocope for bret easton ellis being a homosexual and not a wall street trader like his dad
can easy money, easier women and superficial consoomerism really drive a young man mad?
Cinemaphile preferring the book just shows that this place is full of contrarian midwits these daya.
the movie is still great and one of my favorite movies but the book is peak comedy kino
>when patrick keeps pepper spraying the girl he has nail gunned to the floor to keep her from passing out during his sessions
Life hacks.
IMO the book has funnier moments like when he's sexually harassing random callers and one of the callers thinks it's her dad and it kills Batemans mood.
The book
The movie is good but so many great scenes are cut out
>I see a ten-year-old girl standing by her mother, who is buying a scarf, some israeliteelry, and I’m thinking: Not bad.
I think they're both on the same level, in different ways
The book obviously has way more detail and in-depth exploration of Patrick Bateman's character and psychology, and there's a whole lot of truly fricked up moments you'd never get away with doing in a film, and in a lot of places it's genuinely fricking funny. But it also suffers from the (100% intentional) repetition and boredom. Patrick does the same things over and over again, he worries and breaks down over and over, he does a bit of the old ultraviolence again and again, and there's the endless lists of what brands the characters are wearing or what tech they've got that you just end up skimming over. It's tiring and boring in places, deliberately so. The plot doesn't even get going until halfway through the book. I understand what BEE was going for there in aiming to desensitize the reader to both the violence and the 80s yuppie life, but regardless of intention, it does just wear you down.
The film is an incredibly effective adaptation. It condenses the book to its essential parts, and in a lot of scenes dialogue is taken directly from the page, while still retaining enough of the repetition and monotony to get the same point about desensitisation across to the audience. The cast is also fantastic; obviously there's Christian Bale carrying the whole film, but then the supporting actors (particularly Leto, Dafoe, Witherspoon) are also really good in their roles, and it keeps the humour of the book well. However, the film doesn't get everything. The murders and crimes aren't as horrifically fricked up, and the lack of Patrick's narration/stream of consciousness means that certain elements are lost. It doesn't really show just how stupid Patrick clearly is despite thinking he's a super intelligent psycho, so the constant comedy there is lost, and the film doesn't lean into the unreliable narrator aspect until the very end, which is the biggest negative for me.
But in the end they're both great.
my final thesis at college was a Lacanian psychoanalysis of Bateman's motivations and self-image and thinking about it still makes me cringe into a small raisin
Why are commies so often obsessed with consumerism in their personal lives? Are their politics just projection?
i recommend Ellis' book Glamorama for similar themes
Does it have memes and racism?
it's Zoolander with graphic violence and sex
>I recommend Ellis' book
if this sentence doesn't end with American Psycho it is a lie, everything else is objectively absolute garbage
ESPECIALLY Less Than Zero
nah Glamorama is good. bit too long (i would cut the beginning stuff in New York in half) but once he gets on the boat it's a hell of a ride
His new book is gonna be a HBO series. Half of it is gay sex and masturbation
wonder if he wrote it specifically for streaming service bait. They love that type of shit
He probably wrote it with this in mind, he's been trying to get televised for years, sending scripts everywhere but it never worked out until now.
The characters are all teens too, it's about lady two years of high school
*Last