I recently watched American Psycho, a movie based on the novel written by Bret Easton Ellis. The movie is about the descent into madness of a delusional psychotic named Patrick Bateman, who is a serial killer either in his head or in reality — the story is intentionally vague on that point. There were some very curious political intrigues surrounding the book and film, beginning with a successful protest by NOW against the book’s publication by Simon & Schuster (Vintage ended up publishing the novel in 1991) due to its allegedly misogynistic nature, and continuing through the production of the film in 2000. This led to a deal whereby production of the movie was handled both directly and indirectly by feminists, which was probably accepted by Ellis as the only possible way to get the story onto the big screen.
Feminist director Mary Harron and lesbian writer Guinevere Turner collaborated to write the screenplay. Harron directed the movie, and Gloria Steinem lobbied actors to influence who should be cast as Patrick Bateman. Ultimately, Christian Bale got the part, and right around the same time Steinem married Christian’s father, David Bale. It is undeniable that a feminist clique had a great deal to do with the production of the film, and this can be seen quite clearly in the end product. Although this may have profoundly changed the nature of the story, the resulting film is valuable for the insight it gives us into feminist psychology regarding men.
One thing I noticed while watching the film was an uncanny resemblance to the Mad Men TV series. The attention to clothing and grooming, the uniform corporate atmosphere, and the callous, sociopathic behavior of the men all reminded me very much of Don Draper’s life. Mad Men, which is also written largely by women, portrays men in essentially the same light as American Psycho, that is, as soulless beasts driven only by lust and greed.
As I am not a woman, and can merely imagine what goes on in the female mind, I can only speculate as to whether this is actually how women view men. Perhaps it is a uniquely American phenomenon, but amongst women there seems to be something approaching worship of this twisted masculine ideal – veneration at the very least – and I don’t think men in general are aware of this, because they are too preoccupied with another cult.
The film opens with an elegant and very effeminate dinner, at which the impeccably dressed and clean-shaven men of Pierce & Pierce (where Bateman is VP) make crude, politically-incorrect jokes while blowing hundreds of dollars and eating exotic animals. They are caricatures of men operating against a feminine backdrop of elegant dining, replete with dapper waiters, exquisite dining linens, cutlery and artistically arranged dishes. In the next scene, Patrick Bateman goes through his daily routine, which includes applying cosmetic concoctions to his body and face, doing exercises to improve his appearance, and grooming himself for another day at the office. This scene borders on pornographic, as Christian Bale’s nude, toned, and waxed body is constantly on display. Again, the backdrop is distinctly feminine, with a gorgeous bathroom, a tanning booth, and an array of cosmetic products. One gets the sense that Bateman, the serial killer, embodies everything that women desire.
Aside from his preoccupation with his appearance, Bateman is obsessed with 1980s pop singers, such as Phil Collins and Whitney Houston. When he isn’t obsessing over trivial details and trivial culture, he murders people and has sex, often at the same time. Patrick has no personality to speak of, nor does he have any real humanity. His emotions all stem from two basic instincts: a drive for status and an insatiable lust for both sex and blood. In the narrative, Bateman states that he is flesh and blood, but he is not really there. He can be felt and seen, but beyond the material, there is no substance to him. It is here that I suspect we might find the greatest divergence between the feminist interpretation of the tale and Ellis’s intent. To feminists, Bateman is the patriarchy; a mechanical, inhuman force, devoid of warmth or human frailty, but incorporating all the forbidden desires of women. Perhaps it is the story of Eve, and Bateman himself is the serpent, but if so Adam is strangely absent from the narrative.
In The Spearhead many of us have commented on the issue of Victorian ideals and how they have had a profound effect on our culture. We often write of the pedestalization of Western women, and how this has directly led to many of the problems afflicting us today. The ideal of the blameless, chaste woman, who is neither real nor human, remains a potent cultural icon. In fact, outsiders might even suggest that there is an element of religious veneration inherent to this cultural trait. Many men and women have discussed this aspect of the Anglo psyche, but there is another side to the Victorian ideal that we too often neglect. There is the necessary complement, and I am starting to understand that women, too, have an idealized vision of men that is every bit as unnatural and inhuman as the Victorian doll on the pedestal that has led to our reluctance to treat women as the flawed, fallen human beings that they are.
If anything offers a counterpart to the woman on the pedestal, it is the depraved, dangerous, bestial man portrayed by Patrick Bateman. His dark, compulsively acquisitive, violent and sexual nature is the nemesis, and also the consort, of the asexual paragon of virtue and light that we have fashioned as the essence of femininity. If Lucy Manette, the angelic heroine of Dickens’ Tale of Two Cities, is the archetypical female goddess as imagined by a male artist, then Mary Harron’s Patrick Bateman, dripping with bloody murder and raw sexuality, is the male god as imagined by the female artist. He is insane, soulless and hellbound, yet Bateman is more demon than damned, for he is not a fallen human so much as he is the recrudescence of hell on earth. It is an oddly similar, yet sexually inverted, theme to the Hindu relationship between Shiva and Kali.
The more we delve into feminism and its elemental concepts, the more apparent it becomes that we are struggling against a meta-religion that is deeply ingrained in the Anglosphere’s psyche. Perhaps we will have to accept that we dissenters are actually heretics who are leaning on pillars that support the entire edifice of our civilization as it has emerged following the 20th century. We are, after all, challenging the fundamental concepts of ourselves as men and women, without which we would have to start over with something entirely different. Perhaps, therefore, it is our responsibility to make some effort to articulate a replacement. More and more, I see feminism as a challenge to us men to do just that, and at this point I don’t see that we have an alternative.
