4. American Psycho (2000)
Patrick Bateman is an investment banker Yuppie in 1980s New York. Naturally, he chums about with other Yuppies, playing a perpetual meaningless game of oneupmanship against each other - such as who has the best business cards. Bateman has a Yuppie girlfriend Evelyn, whom he doesn't possess an iota of feeling for. He fleshes out his vapid existence by serial killing. We first witness him killing a homeless man and dog. Why? His business cards were not up to scratch. This tragic fact leads Bateman to murder Paul who bested him in the swanky business card stakes. From then it's a steady downhill spiral of brutalising and killing hookers. The guilt gets too much for Bateman and he drops hints that he may have murdered people to his friends. He eventually confesses to all the crimes to the police but they think he is making things up. Suffering no punishment, Bateman is robbed of catharsis and his confession remains a useless entity. Not as brutal as the book, the film version of American Psycho is still pretty grotesque. It is also darkly humorous and very funny in places - especially the scenes in which Patrick and his mates try to out-yuppie each other and Patrick gets into such an angry, murderous state if he is out-yuppied. The hideous threesome with Elizabeth and Christie was the main bone of contention with the MPAA and thus the reason American Psycho was originally given an NC-17 rating. Some cuts to that scene rendered it an R. But it remains at its core an NC-17 rating due to its inherently adult themes and brutal violence which is shocking and perpetrated with such gusto by Bateman.