American Psycho (film) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

American Psycho is a 2000 cult

Cult film

A cult film, also commonly referred to as a cult classic, is a film that has acquired a highly devoted but specific group of fans. Often, cult movies have failed to achieve fame outside the small fanbases; however, there have been exceptions that have managed to gain fame among mainstream audiences...

thriller film directed by Mary Harron

Mary Harron

Mary Harron is a Canadian filmmaker and screenwriter best known for her films I Shot Andy Warhol, American Psycho and The Notorious Bettie Page.-Overview:...

based on Bret Easton Ellis

Bret Easton Ellis

Bret Easton Ellis is an American novelist and short story writer. His works have been translated into 27 different languages. He was regarded as one of the so-called literary Brat Pack, which also included Tama Janowitz and Jay McInerney...

's novel of the same name

American Psycho

American Psycho is a psychological thriller and satirical novel by Bret Easton Ellis, published in 1991. The story is told in the first person by the protagonist, serial killer and Manhattan businessman Patrick Bateman. The book's graphic violence and sexual content generated a great deal of...

. Though predominantly a psycho thriller

Psychological thriller

Psychological thriller is a specific sub-genre of the broad ranged thriller with heavy focus on characters. However, it often incorporates elements from the mystery and drama genre, along with the typical traits of the thriller genre...

, the film also blends elements of horror

Horror film

Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...

, satire

Satire

Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...

, and black comedy

Black comedy

A black comedy, or dark comedy, is a comic work that employs black humor or gallows humor. The definition of black humor is problematic; it has been argued that it corresponds to the earlier concept of gallows humor; and that, as humor has been defined since Freud as a comedic act that anesthetizes...

. It stars Christian Bale

Christian Bale

Christian Charles Philip Bale is an English actor. Best known for his roles in American films, Bale has starred in both big budget Hollywood films and the smaller projects from independent producers and art houses....

as Patrick Bateman

Patrick Bateman

Patrick Bateman is a fictional character, the antihero and narrator of the novel American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis, and its film adaptation. He has also briefly appeared in other Ellis novels.-Biography and profile:...

, with Jared Leto

Jared Leto

Jared Joseph Leto is an American actor, director, producer, occasional model and musician. Leto has appeared in both big budget Hollywood films and smaller projects from independent producers and art houses. He rose to prominence for playing Jordan Catalano in the teenage drama My So-Called Life...

, Josh Lucas

Josh Lucas

Josh Lucas is an American actor. He has appeared in many films, including Glory Road, A Beautiful Mind, and Poseidon.-Early life:...

, Justin Theroux, Bill Sage

Bill Sage

William "Bill" Sage III is an American actor and alumnus of State University of New York at Purchase.- Filmography :* Simple Men ... as Dennis McCabe* Flirt ... as Bill...

, Chloë Sevigny

Chloë Sevigny

Chloë Stevens Sevigny is an American film actress, fashion designer and former model. Sevigny gained reputation for her eclectic fashion sense and developed a broad career in the fashion industry in the mid 1990s, both for modeling and for her work at New York's Sassy magazine, which labeled her...

, Reese Witherspoon

Reese Witherspoon

Laura Jeanne Reese Witherspoon , better known as Reese Witherspoon, is an American actress and film producer. Witherspoon landed her first feature role as the female lead in the film The Man in the Moon in 1991; later that year she made her television acting debut, in the cable movie Wildflower...

, Willem Dafoe

Willem Dafoe

Willem Dafoe is an American film, stage, and voice actor, and a founding member of the experimental theatre company The Wooster Group...

, and Samantha Mathis

Samantha Mathis

Samantha Mathis is an American actress. The daughter of actress Bibi Besch, Mathis made her film debut in Pump Up the Volume , opposite Christian Slater...

. The film focuses on Wall Street

Wall Street

Wall Street refers to the financial district of New York City, named after and centered on the eight-block-long street running from Broadway to South Street on the East River in Lower Manhattan. Over time, the term has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, or...

yuppie

Yuppie

Yuppie is a term that refers to a member of the upper middle class or upper class in their 20s or 30s. It first came into use in the early-1980s and largely faded from American popular culture in the late-1980s, due to the 1987 stock market crash and the early 1990s recession...

Patrick Bateman (Bale), whose mental instability and blood lust lead him to serial killing.