Errrrr.... can I have my money back, please?

Rating: 6/10 (26 April 2000)

That's what I would have said if I hadn't won free tickets. Even then I was half-tempted.
American Psycho is a movie above average in execution but ultimately hollow with an anti-climatic ending the like of which I've never seen before. Obviously this is a no-spoiler zone so I can't reveal it, but suffice it to say that rather than the reality-shifting conceit that turns great films (such as Fight Club or Jacob's Ladder) into arguably greater ones, turns this one into a thorough waste of time and effort.
Can it be true that this film has already generated controversy? Surely not? Surely in the 21st century we're all used to disembodied heads and chainsaw massacres by now? And if all the right-wing lobbies that complain about sex and violence in movies spend their whole time watching the stuff in order to complain about it, then how come they're not converted into our very own Patrick Batemans? The film actually raises this point itself, with Bateman (Christian Bale), watching Texas Chainsaw Massacre while exercising.
This being England, we got to see a version 4 minutes longer than its U.S. counterpart, as it included senses of lesbianism. It sometimes bothers me that the world is still full of such reactionism that such things can fall foul of censorship. What bothers me more is that films which usually attract such controversy as this usually have the saving grace of being actually quite good - A Clockwork Orange being a notable success in that field. American Psycho, meanwhile, is a fairly average movie, with gory violence that neither shocks nor compels, and a vaguely witty narrative that can be seen as satirical by the same sort of people that think Scream is cleverly ironic.
Bale plays a psychotic with some interesting characteristics. He's anally retentive and talks his victims through the critical plusses of MOR 80s pop-rock. He's also pro-racial equality, yet homophobic and narcissistic. Some of these conflicting character traits are interesting, and Bale does well becoming a semi-monotone serial killer while managing to maintain a level of charisma.
I must make a confession, tantamount to heresy - I haven't read the very popular book on which the film is based. But I see that factor as largely irrelevant; the film should stand on it's own merits, exist without it's source text. So I cannot judge whether it represents the visual ideology of the novel, or whether it betrays its concept. What I do know of the film is that while it does have some flimsy barbs about the nature of consumerism and pitiless American culture, it is ultimately shallow and without meaning.
The cast are all great, the direction is good without being ostentatious and the dialogue is fresh without ever - quite - getting too silly. What it lacks is a core, or purpose. And when the final twist ending comes along, it defies all that went before it and makes you realise that you've sat through a film as pumped-up, self-serving and internally vacant as it's central character.