*Spoiler Alert: The piece contains spoilers from American Psycho. Make sure you watch the film before you read it.*

It’s been two decades since we met Patrick Bateman for the first time in Marry Harron’s non-compos mentis American Psycho. Adapted from Bret Easton Ellis’ novel of the same name, American Psycho is regarded as one of the most mind-boggling films. While the story seems pretty straightforward, a more observant viewer will notice several instances during the movie that indicates symbolism associated with materialism, human psychology, and emotions such as jealousy and self-obsession.

The film, which helped Christian Bale etch his name in the film industry with a captivating performance, has made all of us wonder about its plot and especially that strange ending. In these twenty years, I guess there have been at least a hundred articles theorizing what the hell happened in this movie, which was intentionally ended with an open and ambiguous climax.

In this piece, I intend to decide all the plot points and the ending. Harron so deeply rigs these points in the film that it takes more than just a single viewing experience with a bowl of popcorn on your couch, so I watched it back to back. So, let’s get on with it and break this hell of a film piece by piece.

Decoding American Psycho

Materialism and Executive Lifestyle

The film is a satirical take on the self-obsessed executive lifestyle of American elites, who resort to materialistic happiness to express their high-class financial position. From struggling to book overcrowded fancy restaurants to fighting over who has the fanciest business card, these people are affected by everything that may help them show off.

Our protagonist, Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale), belongs to such a community. He can’t stand if someone outmatches him even by an inch. At the very beginning of the film, Patrick shows off his daily lifestyle, which includes his extensive workout routine, his diet, and his bathing products that all are highly important for him. He can’t stand when his business card is less fancy than those of his colleagues. He wants to beat his colleagues in poaching clients too.

There is an opening monologue narrated by Bateman where he goes like-

“There is no me. There is an idea of a Patrick Bateman, some kind of abstraction, but there is no real me. Only an entity, something illusory. And though I can hide my cold gaze, and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours, and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable, I simply am not there.”

Patrick Bateman here declines his existence. For some viewers, this monologue has meant that through the entire film, Bateman has only been a figment. But I believe this is a reference to the fact that he no longer knows who he is given the fact he only recognizes himself through his financial status, and that’s how wishes others to know him. This can also be an understanding of why he kills people he doesn’t get along with. The film somehow portrays

Bateman as this fake competitive and materialistic person, who commit murders to take out his frustration of not matching up to the others or those who try to undermine him. Bateman has lost his grip on his emotional self and has completely turned into this psychotic killer he is, who kills for reminding him that he still overpowers others, even if it means killing them for no reason at all.  

Mistaken Identities

Mistaken Identities is a core aspect of American Psycho. From the beginning, there are instances that people around Bateman always mistaken him for someone else. This becomes the cynosure of the film’s climactic ending, where his lawyer Harold (Stephen Bogaert), to whom he has confessed of killing all those people, brushes the entire conversation and calls him “Davis.” He even neglects Bateman even when he angrily counters that he is indeed Patrick Bateman. Let’s look upon some other such instances throughout the film:

One of the first scenes of the film portrays Bateman sitting in a restaurant with his “friends/colleagues,” David Van Patten (Bill Sage), Craig McDermott (Josh Lucas), and Timothy Bryce (Justin Theroux). While the men are talking, McDermott recognizes a colleague from their firm Pierce & Pierce, named Reed Robinson (off-camera character). Contrarily, Bryce claims that a person is Paul Allen. Bateman jumps in and corrects Bryce, pointing to some other man at the restaurant and claiming him to be Paul Allen; despite this, Bryce refuses to believe him.

In another scene, we see Bateman walking through his office corridor with headphones on passing through people he doesn’t care for. A man passes him greeting him as “Hamilton” and even goes on to say nice words about his tan.

One of the major sequence of mistaken identities at Pierce & Pierce is when Bateman comes face to face with the real Paul Allen (Jared Leto) [who Bateman brutally murders later], who mistakes Bateman for “Marcus Halberstram.” He even addresses McDermott wrongfully as “Baxter.” And no one cares to correct him.

Why is there such confusion? Well, Bateman explains to the audience why Paul Allen mistook him for Halberstram. Halberstram is a fellow Pierce & Pierce employee, who wears a similar suit and even shares the same barber as Bateman. These mistaken identities are a reference to the fact that the executives of Pierce & Pierce are so indulged in their materialistic lifestyle that they are recognized not by their work but by their wardrobe and appearance.

It is indicated that they all wear fancy suits and watches, as well as gel their hair in similar styles, and talk only of money, giving them a replicating personality. They practically can’t be distinguished as they have no idea about each others’ lives. It’s their personal choice not to care who is who and that is the reason they don’t correct Paul Allen for his mistake.

Bateman’s Obsession with Music

Patrick Bateman is obsessed with music. He doesn’t just listen to the songs; he analyzes them to understand their deeper meaning. He has an extensive collection of records of his favorite artists, and he seems to know everything about all the songs they ever released. Conversely, his specific choice of music again reflects his fondness for materialism.

Coming back, there are three sequences, where Bateman flaunts his knowledge of three different songs. All three songs are followed by Bateman killing off the people he has in his home. I believe that these three songs imply three different aspects of Bateman’s nature:

Song 1-“Hip to be Square” by Huey Lewis and the News

If you’ve listened to the song, the lyrics are a direct statement from the protagonist that he is fed up with people telling him what’s right for him. He does not want to go along the same way everyone does, and he likes being himself even if that doesn’t match the regular standards of the society.

Bateman himself is such a person, struggling with his lifestyle. There’s a scene where he confesses to his fiance Evelyn (Reese Witherspoon) that he hates his job and the people in it. The only reason he continues with it is that he wants to be part of the crowd.

Wants to fit in. He does not want to become outcast, and that’s why he wants to be confined within the conformity of his executive world, which, in reality, is taking a toll on his mental well-being. He’s even shown to be taking prescription pills, meaning he might be concerned about his mental state.

Song 2- “In Too Deep” by Genesis

Patrick states that for him, this song is a statement of monogamy and commitment. This is one of the failures of his life. He is engaged but constantly cheats on his wife with his friend’s fiance, the girls he picks up in the bar, and even prostitutes. It’s a reflection of one of his life’s aspects, where he has failed to remain loyal and committed to his wife-to-be.

Song 3- “The Greatest Love of All” by Whitney Houston

In the movie, Bateman talks about the song by Houston, who, through this song, has spread the message of self-empathy and self-love among the audience. Our protagonist Patrick Bateman is also a self-centered man who loves himself. He takes care of himself through rigorous health, diet, and personal care routine. He does not rely on others to care for him, and he lives on his terms, no matter how dangerous they are.

“I have to Return Some Videotapes”

In the movie, Bateman is often seen to run away or divert from uncomfortable conversations or make excuses for his disappearance by claiming that he has some videotapes to return. If you notice, every time he uses these words, there is a murderous reason behind it.

The first time he is seen using this phrase is during a conversation with Det. Kimball (Willem Dafoe), who is investigating Paul Allen’s disappearance. In reality, when he says he was returning videotapes, he was murdering Allen with an ax.

In another scene, he uses this phrase to avoid a conversation with Carruthers, a fellow Pierce & Pierce colleague (who is also attracted to Bateman). He then is almost on the verge of killing his secretary Jean before being interrupted by a phone call.

And then, in the final scene, he breaks up with his fiance Evelyn, leaves her crying, making the same excuse, and then sometime later goes on a killing spree in the streets.

So basically, when he says, “I have to return some videotapes,” he’s hiding his frustration and anger resulting in him killing the next person he sets his eyes upon.

The ENDING of American Psycho

The Scenario

Before we get to the final scene analysis, let’s just remind ourselves of what happened in the end:

Sometime after Bateman breaks up with Evelyn, he’s out one night and ends up at an ATM booth to make a withdrawal. The ATM gives a strange response to bis request, asking him to feed it a stray cat. Bateman picks up a cat and is about to shoot her before a woman interrupts him. He instead shoots her dead. There’s a police car nearby who starts pursuing him. When he’s surrounded by cop cars, he begins to shoot at them. Strangely, the three cars are blown up in flames with a Glock. He then kills a security guard in some building and also a janitor. He then takes shelter in an office, and by this time, there is a helicopter in his pursuit.

Believing his time has come, he confesses to all the murders to his lawyer Harold Carnes. He tells him of all the murders he has committed, including that of Paul Allen’s. But the next day, when he sees Carnes, he not only brushes his confession off but instead recognizes Bateman as Davis, the most striking case of mistaken identities in the film.

Carnes even claims that he has had lunch with Paul Allen just a week before in London, and hence he can’t be dead. The apartment, he used to dispose of his victims’ bodies, is cleaned and renovated with all the pieces of evidence of his crimes erases like they never existed. The film then ends with Bateman telling himself that his confession has all gone in vain.

Are Murders Real?

This is the most common concern of the viewers, whether whatever they witnessed in the film is real or not? Let’s see if it can be:

Let’s take the last scenario. Firstly, how come an ATM asks for a stray cat at the time when a cat happens to stroll around the corner? This alone puts the credibility of the sequence in question. After he kills that woman, somehow, a cop car happens to be around? Even if we take it as a bizarre coincidence, how did he blow up three cop cars with a handgun? I read somewhere he might have shot at the fuel tank.

But in the film, even Bateman is shocked when the cars blow up, and he looks at his gun in shock as he can’t believe what that gun just did. And then you see a helicopter in his pursuit, indicating his mayhem has gained attention; yet, he still manages to wake up good in his bed and go to meet his colleagues. Don’t you think he would have been apprehended by that time; after all, he killed cops for God’s sake.

Then there is this confession. When he makes the call to Carnes, Carnes never picks it up; it instead goes to his answering machine. And when he is confessing, Bateman, who has a strict, organized, and materialistic lifestyle, can’t even recall his victims.

So What Happened in the End?

In my opinion, Bateman’s confession, which is more of an emotional outburst, is his complete loss of grip over sanity. His troubled lifestyle, which he has been living against his wishes just to fit in, has taken a major psychological toll on his mind, and now he can’t take it anymore. That’s why Bateman, who has mercilessly killed all those people, cries when it comes to admitting his guilt. All the frustration he has been piling up against his unwanted job, unloving relationships, and his desire to fit in have pushed him to the brink of insanity and aggression, and this confession is nothing more than that. He never killed those people, and all of that was in his head.

Evidence to Support This

In a scene, he kills a prostitute Christie he hires. Christie makes a run for her life and tries to wake up others in the building but to no avail. No one wakes up even when Bateman is running after her with a buzzing chainsaw, leaving blood trails in the corridor. When Christie runs down the stairs. Bateman throws the running chainsaw down, and it hits Christie in the head.

Now, how come no one ever heard her screams or the buzzing chainsaw? And how come he dispose of her body, cleans the blood trails throughout the stairs, the floor, and the corridor without anyone noticing? It’s clear he never killed her, but everything was a figment of his imagination.

In another scene, he is seen arguing a dry cleaner, a non-English speaking person about his failure to remove stains off his coat. Those stains are blood. At the same time, Bateman meets an old acquaintance there and tells him that the stains are from cranberry juice. There’s no chance one can’t differentiate blood from the juice.

Jean’s Date with Bateman 

And then, of course, the scene where Bateman calls his secretary Jean to his house. While he talks to her, he keeps walking through the hall and ends up standing behind her with a nail gun. He even points the gun to the back of her head, but has a breakdown and allows Jean to go, who does not suspect any foul play. In this scene, Bateman is almost crying when he asks Jean to leave. Why?

This is the scene that strikes me as the ultimate differentiation with Bateman’s imagination and reality. In his aggressive persona, he’s ruthless and doesn’t think before he kills someone. But this date is real, and he cannot bring himself to kill her because he hasn’t ever done it.

The Truth

While Bateman is trying to figure out how come Carnes can be denying his confession, in the background,

When Carnes brushes off Bateman’s confessions, the latter is forced to think of his life and comes to the fact that his confessions have meant nothing and that he will always escape justice. I believe this indicates the fact that Bateman is nowhere near recovering from his aggression and manic, depressive state. Because even after the outburst, he has gone back to his job, his fake acquaintances, and his job he hates. He will no longer have peace if he can’t decide to stop trying to fit in, and he will always remain in control of his psychotic subconscious.

As for Paul’s murder and Det. Kimball’s investigation, Bateman might surely have gone to dinner with Allen, but the part where he takes him to his apartment and murders him is purely imaginary. This accounts for Allen and Carnes luncheon in London.

In the background, Jean finds his diary in his office, where he has drawn illustrations of all the people he killed and how he killed them. He has marked calendar dates with the names of people he killed that day. I believe all the killings he committed were in those journals where he let out his frustration on all the people he hated.

Opinion

In my opinion, American Psycho satirically depicts the high profile executive lifestyle and its after-effects on those addicted and struggling with the luxuries that the world offers. Patrick Bateman is one such individual who has deeply indulged in that lifestyle, turning him into a narcissist, selfish, and aggressive individual. And as that aggression grows, he slowly loses himself and his reality to this darker personality of his subconscious, which destroys everything and everyone he feels hatred towards. He is a definite psychopath; he may not be the killer.

The Catch

However, to this descriptive theory and evidences, there is a catch. In an interview, director Harron stated –

“One thing I think is a failure on my part is people keep coming out of the film thinking that it’s all a dream, and I never intended that. All I wanted was to be ambiguous in the way that the book was. I think it’s a failure of mine in the final scene because I just got the emphasis wrong. I should have left it more open-ended. It makes it look like it was all in his head, and as far as I’m concerned, it’s not.”

Meaning, the director herself is not convinced by the fact that Bateman was innocent, but she believes he did kill all those people. There may be an explanation for this theory as well.

Carnes never met Allen but someone else in London and had lunch with him, just like Allen had with Bateman, believing him to be Marcus Halberstram. And he again misidentified Bateman as Davis, given the fact that mistaken identities is a core aspect of the job these people are in. And for Carnes, a lawyer with many high-profile clients, it’s acceptable if he does not remember them by face.

Harron says that the ending is a “failure at her part” as it weighed too much over the fact that all of that was not real and made Bateman a victim in viewers’ eyes.

Final Word

It’s hard to determine whether he was the killer or not, and one has to choose between the two theories for themselves. In contrast, I’ve settled with the one with Bateman as a psychopathic but not a murderous individual. The film, however, impeccably establishes that desires and unloving luxuries can result in madness and vanity that may drive a person into oblivion, where he loses his grip over his self, and that can lead to horrors such as Bateman’s crimes. It doesn’t matter whether they are real or imaginary; they surely destroy a person.