Caffeinated Clint
OK purists, you were peeved when a Brit boy got the lead in the film version of the eternally-American novel “American Psycho”, weren’t you? But how do you feel now – all these years later? I’m assuming you’re no longer steaming, but inaudibly hiding in a crook, swallowing your pride and freely admitting that Director Mary Harron ultimately did choose the best man for the job. Seriously, can anyone imagine anyone other than Christian Bale as the suit-and-tie wearing lurid socialite, Patrick Bateman? Leonardo DiCaprio (the original choice for Bateman) might have given a good performance – but that doesn’t mean he’d be a shoddier match than Socks and Thongs.
An irrefutably droll, yet still violent, piss-take lampoon of the insatiable Reagan-era, “Psycho” takes a graciously over-the-top performance, a bevy of 80’s pop tunes, a chainsaw, and an enviable stylish business card and plonks them in a liquidizer to mesh. The result is an original, ceaselessly tasty, and freely, memorable movie experience.
Based on the novel by Brett Easton Ellis, “Psycho” centres on the life of a Wall Street Yuppie who basically chops and dices anyone that he feels like – especially those who’ve got a better business card than him. Watch as the charismatic killer Bateman takes a chainsaw to a co-worker, with no less than Huey Lewis and the News playing in the background, watch as he has his way with a couple of loose women, to the beat of Phil Collins, before making minced liver out of them, and behold as . Or does he?
Disc : The type of film that’s ultimately more appreciated as time goes on – I know I love it more and more as time goes by – “American Psycho” finally arrives looking like a million bucks – or the best-looking business card ever.
Unfortunately, star Christian Bale is hardly anywhere to be seen or heard in the extras department. The current Caped Crusader is absent from the vintage commentary tracks (Mary Harron and co-writer Guinevere Turner are the captains of that ship) and the newly-recorded commentary (just Harron), the comprehensive “American Psycho: From Book to Screen” featurette (everyone else seems to be present for this 48-minute feature on transferring Easton Ellis’s novel to film), and “The 80’s Downtown” feature – about the New Yorkers lifestyle of the times. Fortunately, he does pop up in the “Deleted Scenes” section, which is prefaced by interviews with the cast – albeit dated ones.
Yet, even without Bale’s contribution to the special features section, “American Psycho” on 4K is still a great buy – the extras are good, the sound is extraordinary, the video is the best it’s been, and best of all, the movie still plays as well as a well-oiled accordion
