What if you were nothing but the sum of all the products you use to render
your body flawless, all of the brand-name labels you wear? What if you measured
out your life in reservations at whatever restaurant was "in"? What
... more if
consumerist conformity had morphed you into a handsome GQ mannequin, whose name
your closest clone-friends can't remember from moment to moment? With his
fine-planed face and body, his ability to go as blank and beautiful as a runway
model, Christian Bale totally nails Patrick Bateman, empty suit and American
psycho. Maddened by his superficial, antiseptic existence, this picture-perfect
cipher finally explodes, painting his white apartment red by means of ax and
chain saw. How else can he truly get under somebody's skin, make folks ache with
something more than knee-jerk materialism? (Check out AMC-TV's superb "Mad
Men" -- aptly titled, yes? -- where commercial "artists" create and are
themselves infected by the acquisitiveness and conformity of Bateman's crowd.)
(Lions Gate / Courtesy Everett Collection)Close
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