Common Sense Media Review
By Jeffrey M. Anderson, based on child development research. How do we rate?
age 18+
Bloody, gruesome black comedy that's not for kids.
-
Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that American Psycho is based on Bret Easton Ellis's controversial 1991 novel, which is set in the 1980s and deals with materialism, narcissism, and the amassing of great wealth to be spent on personal pleasure. It's also a story about a callous murderer, with several gruesome killings shown, and lots of blood, as well as shots of severed heads and body parts. Sex is an issue, since the main character has both a fiancée and a lover, and then participates in a threesome with a prostitute and yet another woman. Not much nudity is shown, even if sex is strongly implied, although there are some breasts and bottoms on display. Language is also strong, with many uses of "f--k" as well as many other strong words. The characters quite often drink alcohol, smoke cigarettes and cigars, and sometimes snort cocaine or take pills. These characters are clearly irredeemable, and do not learn much of anything during the course of the story. The movie is entertaining in a horrific, comical way, but is certainly not for kids under 18.
To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails.
-
Violence & Scariness
a lot
The movie shows several gruesome killings with gallons of blood on display. These involve stabbing, shooting, explosions, bashing, hacking, and chain-sawing, frequently involving women. The movie does tend to cut away at the last second, leaving more to the imagination than is actually shown. However, severed heads and body parts are shown in a refrigerator and a closet. A clip from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is shown on television during one scene.
Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.
Get started
-
Sex, Romance & Nudity
a lot
The main character has a lover in addition to his fiancée, but also sleeps with, or tries to sleep with, several other women. In one scene, the main character has a "threesome" with a prostitute and a woman friend. Thrusting is shown, as well as brief glimpses of breasts and buttocks. (This scene was extended by a few seconds in the director's cut.) The main character is shown shirtless, with a chiseled torso. His naked bottom is shown in one scene. The character picks up a prostitute. Two women are shown passionately kissing. A woman is shown in a sexy negligee, with her bottom visible. A porn video is briefly visible on TV. A notebook is filled with nude, deviant drawings. There's also some strong innuendo.
Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.
Get started
-
Language
a lot
Strong, fairly frequent language includes "f--k," "s--t," "a--hole," "bitch," "d--k," "vagina," "Goddamn," "loser," and "faggot."
See AlsoAmerican Psycho movie review & film summary (2000) | Roger EbertAmerican Psycho | Rotten TomatoesAmerican Psycho - Movie ReviewsDid you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.
Get started
-
Drinking, Drugs & Smoking
a lot
Many characters, especially the main character, drink alcohol frequently, as well as smoke cigarettes and cigars, snort cocaine, and take pills.
Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.
Get started
-
Products & Purchases
none
Though the characters are strongly materialistic, the movie doesn't specifically mention any brand names. The characters are more concerned with stylish business cards and getting tables at posh restaurants.
-
Positive Messages
none
This is a story about emptiness, as characters simply try to satisfy their urges and cravings, earning huge amounts of money and spending it on pleasure and narcissism. No amount of this will ever be enough. No one ever seems to connect with or care about another human being, and no one really learns any lessons. Women, especially, are treated as objects.
-
Positive Role Models
none
The lead character is a heartless, callous, wealthy man who either kills or fantasizes about killing numerous people, mostly women. His only concerns are for his looks and his possessions. He doesn't care about other people unless they make him look good, or unless they can provide some kind of pleasure.
Where to Watch
Videos and Photos
American Psycho
Parent and Kid Reviews
See all
- Parents say (33)
- Kids say (85)
age 16+
Based on 33 parent reviews
BlitzGuy20 Parent of 10-year-old
November 5, 2022
age 17+
This film is for mature audiences in the right state of mind in almost every regard. Graphic sex, disturbing violence, language and drug themes are relevant throughout.
American Psycho (2000) follows Patrick Bateman, a socially obsessed and psychotic Wall Street businessman who ever so easily loses his grip on self control. The film is very mature and very graphic in every single category presented. The film has violence which, although not particularly graphic onscreen, can be very disturbing depending on the scene, as a lot of the violence is sexually derived and against women. The sexual content of the film is very graphic (depending on where you watch the film), on the HBO MAX version of the film, which is uncut and unrated despite reading so, the threesome scene is prolonged and explicit in nudity. There are several sex scenes in the film no matter the way you watch. There is brief images of drug use (cocaine) and lots of references and dialogue relating to drugs along with themes of drug abuse.VIOLENCE: SEVEREThere are a couple scenes where Patrick talks to women on the street and following scenes imply he killed them. In one of these scenes we see blood stained sheets, in another a strand of hair he took from one of the girls.A completely innocent and desperate homeless man is repeatedly stabbed in the stomach before his dog is stomped and kicked and killed as well. We hear yelping and the scene is quite distressing yet not graphic visually (like most other scenes) however this being the first real scene of violence is surprising.A man, who is clearly drunk and oblivious, is viscously killed with an axe. The killer swings the axe down and blood sprays all over his face (the victim isn’t shown), before he pushes the axe out and blood spills all over the floor. The man then repeatedly keeps slamming his axe down onto the camera spraying blood all over the side of his face before he sits down and smokes a cigar next to the dead body, which is shown slightly out of focus. The impact of the axe is never shown, and the scene isn’t graphic but very, very bloody. He drags the corpse out of the apartment in a bag. After a night of sex, two girls ask to leave the man who payed them (as they are prostitutes) the man says no and that he isn’t done with them. He removes a coat hanger from a compartment and the scene cuts to the women with blood gashes and marks all over their backs and faces with them bleeding profusely as they leave scared. Later one of the women says she needed surgery after the abuse. This is one of the most truly disturbing scenes of the film.During sex, a man performs oral sex on a woman under covers (the actual sex act is shown briefly, but graphically) before the moans of pleasure turn into screaming and blood begins to soak the bed covers. The man emerges from underneath with blood all over his mouth (implying he bit her vagina or body) he gets up fully nude and covered in blood, grabs a chainsaw and chases after a prostitute in his apartment. She runs from room to room discovering dead and severed bodies in closets and on the floors. Severed heads and limbs are shown with blood caking the walls as the woman runs from the man with a chainsaw. The man catches the woman in a room with a dead naked woman on the floor but she kicks and bites him, he curses at her and she runs down a stairwell. The man then drops the chainsaw down the stairwell onto her. The chainsaw drops onto her body and it is shown stabbed into her back with blood pooled all over the floor below her. This scene is incredibly intense and very disturbing and graphic.A severed head of a woman is shown in a fridge. Brief and not graphic. A man points a gun at a kitten. An elderly woman approaches and is shot in the chest and killed (not graphic). After the man begins shooting at cops, killing one and exploding cars killing others. The man walks into a building and shoots a desk clerk in the head spraying a small amount of blood on the wall behind him. He kills a janitor in a building and leaves. None of the violence or killing in this sequence is strong, graphic or heavy like the other scenes as it is over the top and brief. We see pre-school level illustrations of heinous violence. These show chopped up, severed and sexually violated women (for example, a shotgun shoved up a woman’s behind) however all of these images are brief but quite disturbing to look at due to their nature.LANGUAGE: SEVERELots of swearing. 28 uses of “f*ck”, uses of “b*tch”, “sh*t” and “f*ggot” as well.SEXUAL CONTENT: SEVEREA man’s buttocks are shown as he showers.A man’s pubic hair can be seen as he lays in a tanning bed, yet no nudity is shown.Pornography is shown playing on a TV. It shows what appears to be two women having sex with each other and a woman riding on top of a man. Graphic nudity (but no genitals) are shown with bare breasts and buttocks as the woman rides up top the man and rubs up and fondles the other woman. Lots of moaning and images are shown but the sex is shown in the background and not focused on.In the most sexually explicit part of the film, a man orders a prostitute to clean her vagina in the bath. She is shown doing this on her knees (no explicit nudity) before she is taken out to another prostitute. The other prostitute undresses and starts dancing suggestively while the man orders the other woman to get on her knees so that the other woman can “see her a**hole” and then orders the woman to “don’t just stare at it, eat it!”. The woman approaches the other woman and begins presumably doing this off camera before this cuts to a graphic threesome. The man is shown thrusting into both fully nude women from behind in doggystyle, then in several different positions shown in full graphic detail throughout. They thrust, get into different positions and mount on each other in several different explicit ways showing full nudity (however genitals are hard to make out due to the quick cuts), the man checks himself out in the mirror as he thrusts into the women, their legs and fully nude bodies including breasts are shown as he does this. The scene is prolonged (lasting 5+ minutes from the bathtub) and is very hard to watch and uncomfortable.A man and a woman are shown having sex on a bed. The man thrusts into the woman’s crotch as he finishes. The sex is shown with clothing obscuring graphic detail and the scene is brief and not as graphic as the other scenes.A man has sex with two women under the covers of a bed. He is then shown performing oral sex in the other woman under the covers, yet as the other woman gets out of the bed we see him very explicitly with his head in between the woman’s legs. It is then revealed he ate or bit the woman’s vagina and killed her. The scene cuts to an intense chase through the halls where the man is fully nude (the chainsaw obscures his penis) where his buttocks are shown. Several naked corpses of women exposing breasts and buttocks are shown.Lots of sexual dialogue and references.Naked women are shown in pre-school level drawings. The women in these drab wings are violated in many ways. Vaginas and breasts are shown in these rough pictures, but they are brief.OVERALL: 17+
jcmcdowell Adult
November 15, 2021
age 18+
Too Grisly and Shocking to Watch Twice!
I have only seen this movie once, and once was enough! This movie is extremely gory with shocking and upsetting imagery and carnage. NO ONE under 18 should see this movie. There is nothing redeeming in it, since it is about a man who works at his father’s stock company and has an elegant home and doesn’t appear to have any kind of upsetting past that would make him so twisted on the inside. But at the end, it really makes you think if all of the violence actually happened, or if he never committed any of those murders and instead just had an extremely realistic imagination. Whatever the case, it is too unnerving and chilling to watch a second time. And it can really mess someone up if they do not take caution and watch it over and over again. This is strictly for adults only and frankly, I do not believe that it is for any age. There are a few scenes free of violence and peril, but the scenes that are violent and perilous are deeply disturbing and stay with you long after the movie finishes.
See all 33 parent reviews
What's the Story?
Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale) makes a lot of money in some kind of financial job that doesn't seem to require much work. Instead, he spends time drinking with friends, snorting cocaine, keeping up appearances with his fiancée Evelyn Williams (Reese Witherspoon), sleeping with other women, and -- oh yes -- indulging his psychotic urges to kill people, going so far as to invite prostitutes, and even his loyal secretary (Chloe Sevigny) to his apartment for some deviant behavior. Things take a turn for the worse when a cop (Willem Dafoe) begins investigating the disappearance of one of Patrick's acquaintances. But even then, Patrick can't seem to stop, pursuing his devilish hobby until the breaking point.
Is It Any Good?
Our review:
Parents say (33):
Kids say (85):
Adapted from a novel by Bret Easton Ellis, AMERICAN PSYCHO largely misses some of the book's more pointed critical and satirical points, going more directly for dark comedy and shocking horror. It's too bad that director Mary Harron and her co-screenwriter, actress Guinevere Turner (who plays one of Patrick's victims), couldn't have given it a fresher, more feminist spin. As it is, the movie's depiction of a young, wealthy culture looks almost as appealing as it does repellent.
Fortunately, the way the movie mixes these ingredients makes it subversively fun to watch. Certain scenes -- especially when Patrick listens to banal pop music (Phil Collins, Huey Lewis and the News, etc.) while preparing for his murders -- push the envelope so far that the only breaking point is laughter. And Christian Bale's performance helps a great deal; he's never been so fearless in a role, or so in touch with a character's darkest fears and desires. However, many movie fans will not like the twist ending.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the movie's bloody violence. Does it seem to go over the top? What reactions do these scenes cause? Laughter? Squeals? Shock?
How does the movie connect sex with violence?
What does this movie say about the male body image? Does Patrick represent an impossible physical ideal to live up to? What does he mean when he says he could still improve his looks?
What does this movie have to say about money, materialism, and consumer culture? What do these people spend their money on? Do they seem happy?
Why do these characters drink so much, in addition to smoking and taking drugs? What are they looking for? What other options do they have?
Movie Details
- In theaters : April 14, 2000
- On DVD or streaming : September 5, 2000
- Cast : Christian Bale, Reese Witherspoon, Chloe Sevigny
- Director : Mary Harron
- Inclusion Information : Female directors, Female actors
- Studio : Lionsgate
- Genre : Horror
- Run time : 102 minutes
- MPAA rating : R
- MPAA explanation : strong violence, sexuality, drug use and language
- Last updated : November 24, 2024
Did we miss something on diversity?
Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by
American Psycho
Suggest an Update
Your privacy is important to us. We won't share this comment without your permission. If you chose to provide an email address, it will only be used to contact you about your comment. See our privacy policy.