American Psycho / Fridge

At the end of the film, Bateman's lawyer insists Bateman couldn't have murdered Paul Allen, as the lawyer had dinner with Allen only a few days ago. While this might seem to support the notion that the murders were all in his head, it's shaky evidence at best; Bateman's lawyer confuses Bateman for another one of his clients, so who's to say he really had dinner with Allen, instead of another yuppie he thought to be Allen?
- This is actually hinted at twice, during the final scenes of the movie at Harry's Bar. First, when Bateman walks in and sits down with the others, McDermott gestures over to Bryce and mentions that he "just got back, and he's drinking mineral water. He's a changed man." This indicates that Bryce has just returned from a not-insignificant trip. Where to? Well, just after Ronald Reagan's speech later on, if you pay close attention, Bryce speaks several of his lines in a bad British accent, as a pretentious person like him might do after spending a few days in England. It seems likely that Carnes had dinner in London with Bryce, whom he thinks is called Paul Allen. ^note
Throughout the film, Bateman goes around making Sarcastic Confessions to different people, admitting to his murders. At first, this might not seem like much. But at the end of the film when Bateman tries to convince his lawyer that he's a serial killer, he doesn't listen. Those earlier scenes were foreshadowing that no matter how many people Bateman confesses to, his crimes will never be noticed.
I just realised why the main character's name is significant. Patrick Bate man.
- He also appears to Bait all of his victims.
Bateman's lengthy descriptions of the outfits that people wear have a slightly sinister hidden purpose. After a bit, the reader stops bothering to read every little detail about how "Hamlin is wearing a suit by Lubiam, a great looking striped spread-collar cotton shirt from Burberry, a silk tie by Resikeio and a belt from Ralph Lauren," which occurs nearly every chapter. This causes the reader, much like the yuppies themselves, to not pay that close attention to what Bateman is saying, which can, in a few cases, much like his "friends," cause the reader to miss something horrific that Bateman might say mid narration, while simultaneously showing how the reader, who is supposedly actively "listening" to what Bateman has to say, begins to treat what he has to say about things with the same lack of care that the yuppies do.
- It also shows exactly how shallow he is; he doesn't describe faces or personalities, just designer clothes.
Word of God said that he very deliberately chose what outfits that he was describing in any given scene, so that if you actually look up the clothing products, you'd realize how clownish and stupid they look together.
- Related to the clothes as well - almost every time the narrator, in a single scene, praises someone's clothes (usually his own) and ridicules someone else's clothes, the two people being talked about are wearing almost identical outfits- but from different brands!
The movie is well known for it's hilarious copypasta where Patrick talks about the intricacies of Huey Lewis and the News, which might sound like a funny rant made at random - but it has it's meaning within the movie besides that. First of all, there's the obvious irony of Patrick liking Huey Lewis for being Artistically Appealing^note, second of all; the note about Elvis Costello being less cynical than Huey-Lewis raises a few eyebrows, as Costello's work is well known for being far more cynical than Huey Lewis ever was. Meaning, his entire rant is genuinely him saying things which barely make sense, or are just copy-pasted from bland reviews of said artists themselves.
In the movie, Patrick's business card is colored "bone". Patrick's a Serial Killer.
- Also note that Bateman's card has a typo, spelling the company's name as "Pierce &Pierce", while everyone else's cards have it as "Pierce & Pierce", a very obvious mistake that nobody else seems to notice. Possibly because nobody at the table noticed that they had all misspelled "Acquisitions" as "Aquisitions".

All the business cards presented during the showdown are misaligned, with the lettering being crooked, off-center, or both. Plus, all misspell "Acquisition" (omitting the "c") while Patrick's is also missing a space between the ampersand and second "Pierce" in "Pierce & Pierce". This shows that for all their bravado and posturing, the men have no attention to detail and are more concerned about how things look at first glance.
The Wall Street firm Bateman works for is called Pierce & Pierce, also the name of the firm Sherman McCoy works for in The Bonfire of the Vanities.
The first time I saw the movie, I was trying to figure out what the artworks in Patrick's apartment were supposed to be depicting. (the black and white art print of the man in the suit) At first I thought the man was supposed to be falling but with the pose, I realized the pose suggested he is being attacked, with his arm held up defensively. Can also count as Foreshadowing if you notice it before Paul Allen gets axed in Bateman's apartment.
- The images are from a series called "Men In The Cities" by Robert Longo. Longo took friends to his studio where he photographed them dodging tennis balls and being pulled by ropes, then made charcoal drawings of the photos. The work was iconic within the New York art scene in the mid 80s, it makes sense someone like Bateman would own some of them. The fact that they look like someone being attacked is also probably a happy coincidence.
If you listen to the music Patrick Bateman plays and speaks passionately about during his most graphic murders at his apartment building, you notice the message in the songs describe Bateman's personality. Huey Lewis and the News song "Hip To Be Square" is a song about faking it to make it and blending into society rather than standing out, which Bateman admits to his fiancé he was doing, as well as him making this clear through narration. The second song was Whitney Houston's "Greatest Love Of All", which is about the power of loving ones self. Simply put, Patrick Bateman fakes his personality to hide his true nature, and the only person he cares about is himself.
- There's also the irony in "Hip To Be Square" being in the film at all. Patrick's own interpretation of the song is that it is about the "pleasures of conformity, and the importance of trends". This is the exact opposite of Patrick's own motivation, which is that he desires an escape from that very conformity. If he practiced what he preached, the entire story would've never happened.
Paul Allen and Patrick's lawyer both mistake him for someone else and are the only two people (in the film, anyway) who think of 'Patrick Bateman' as a complete dork. The only other character referred to in this way (by Patrick himself) is Luis Carruthers. It's likely that Paul Allen and Patrick's lawyer both think Luis is actually Patrick Bateman. Paul could even have mistaken Luis' fiancé Courtney for Evelyn.
Patrick says that he disposes of Paul Allen's body at the same time that he arrives at his apartment. This doesn't make any sense, and sounds rather handwavey. It's actually a hint that Patrick is imagining the murders.
- There are a few more hints to this that are fairly easy to overlook. The reader can buy that Bateman's friends and business associates might be so self-absorbed and vapid that they don't notice his many admissions to his crimes, but having the maid come in and clean up the blood in his apartment, who also fails to notice direct evidence that something gruesome obviously took place in his home? He kills a police officer with a .357 magnum, is spotted by several other officers while in pursuit, then he just... ducks into his apartment and the matter instantly goes away forever? His murders may or may not take place 100% in his head, but it seems like if he is doing any real killing, then it's at least very heavily embellished and filtered through his insanity, given how often reality seems to bend over backwards to accommodate him (and no, it does not matter how affluent you are; if you shoot a cop in the head the other cops will keep looking for you and aren't going to back off just because you're a white male yuppie with seven figures in the bank). There are also other details that don't really pass the sniff test for a knowledgeable reader, like the Made of Plasticine nature of some of the more grotesque mutilations Patrick commits, and the very questionable knowledge of the guns he supposedly has, like how he purports to own a "TEC Uzi" (there's no such thing, and "Uzi" has been a genericized term for compact, pistol-type submachine guns for a long time, being a classic instance of Misidentified Weapons,) and he describes his slapping a "clip" into his .357 before going on that shooting spree, which revolvers do not use (automatic pistols in .357 magnum caliber actually were around in the 80's, including the famous Desert Eagle, but given the details and specifics he displays with other subjects, one suspects that Ellis would have made it clear if that's what Bateman was using). Things like this give the impression that what we're witnessing him do is mostly happening within his fevered imagination, colored as it is by the all the superviolent action and horror movies he likes to watch.
There's a pragmatic reason why Patrick turns up the music for Paul's murder. He wants to use loud music to cover up the noise of the murder.
- Well.. Yeah.
In the book, pretty much every outfit described by Bateman is blatantly mismatched, but not because the people around him wear mismatched combinations of clothes but rather because Bateman is terrible at recognizing brands of clothing.
When Patrick Bateman calls his lawyer to confess, he's sobbing and sniffling (at least in the movie). Those sounds could easily be mistaken for somebody trying to hold back laughter, especially over the phone, which is probably part of why said lawyer thought he was being pranked.
In the exact scene where we see Paul mistakes Bateman for Marcus Halberstram, we see him continue with that mistake after they have literally exchanged business cards and examined them in detail. Which is to say, Paul was able to look at the font and shade of white used for the card... but without ever actually reading it.

Early on in the book in a dinner conversation Patrick quietly, and coyly, mutters this line, in response to Evelyn's claim of him being a boy next door type.
"No I'm not," he laughs, "I'm a fucking evil psychopath."

While this line is both devilishly humorous yet alarming on the first read of the book, one is most likely imagining the Bateman played by Christian Bale saying these lines, and it elicits a bit of an "ahaha, he's an american psycho," on the second read of the book, once the reader has digested the full, dreadful, unending nightmare of Bateman's utter devotion to murders of the most heinous and disgusting degree, one probably not seen in many other books. The second reading of this line, especially in respect to what he did to Bethany, the girl whose stomach he "ripped open with [his] bare hands," and the girl featured in the chapter "Girl" (the rat one), this line made me more than a little queasy.Well played, Easton Ellis. Well played.

There is one potentially for an employee named Marcus Malberstram. Bateman claims they wear the same glasses, use the same barber, and wear the same type of suits, and Marcus even does the same job as Bateman. This is the reason many people mistake one for the other. If this is true, then if the murders are proven real, Malberstram could easy be the one charged with the serial killings and convicted, not Bateman, which might have been his plan all along in dressing like him.

Fridge / American Psycho

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