Patrick Bateman: sadistic pyschopath with a deranged desire for wanton destruction…or hapless victim of the various schema of his own mind and the societal pressures of his day?
To me, quite frankly, nothing tops the irreverent yet strangely eloquent dissections of 80s music in this film. Although not actually made in the 80s, the movie is set in the decade, with New York’s Wall Street boom providing the backdrop to this blackest of black comedies. I cannot but help get the feeling that the author of the source material of this movie lived and breathed with his subjects in close quarters, studying finance elites much like an anthropologist studying hunter gatherer tribes in Polynesia.
Where would one put investment banker Patrick Bateman on the ladder of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs? Possibly on level 4. Certainly throughout the movie, Bateman exhibits some esteem issues (notably the scene where he is comparing his business cards to his rivals in the firm). In terms of anything below however, his physical, safety and human comforts are catered for him.
However the most interesting insight I can provide is that perhaps Bateman is actually a full blown level 5. He is attempting to self actualise himself in this film by merely expressing the rigidity, efficiency and vacuity within. After all, Bateman expressly says in a monologue that there is not much to him beneath the routines, the job and intellectual appreciation of music and his salacious sex drive. Perhaps Bateman is a not-to-absurdest alternative interpretation of self actualisation?
I think when people think of self actualisation, people usually mean a person becoming creative, spiritual, perhaps also in sync with nature and so forth.
This may not be the whole truth.
Unfortunately evolution hardwires us to be a competitive species in the face of limited resources. Women’s primary mating strategy is to mate with genetically rich alpha males capable of providing resources. Its arguable whether they are ever really happy when settling down with anything less than an alpha, even if her resource requirements are met by a beta provider in the modern sense. Higher testosterone is linked with higher aggression. The very hormone that provides the catalyst in helping a man meet all his needs and climb up the ladder can also instigate him toward darker ends. Finally, our first instinct as a collective is to eliminate competition rather than sharing resources, even though rationally it may not even be in our economic interest to fight.
Depending on one’s social conditioning, morals and genetics then, its quite possible that self actualisation for a man may involve the destruction of another. Like Muhammed Ali beating Frasier in 1975, or the Red Baron becoming a national hero in WW1 shooting down allied aircraft, or perhaps darkest of all, a right wing political leader implementing his totalitarian and racist vision for his country…
All of this leads to the chilling conclusion, that if some of the Type A personalities of this world were to actually get to the level of self actualisation, what we would see is not fine works of art or a spiritually fulfilled flower girl but a ruthless societal expression of the mechanical personalities and desires that drive these people. The primacy of them as an individual over others, and ultimately other’s subjugation and even dismissal – for good or bad.
Bateman eventually breaks down after a massive killing spree and unloads himself unto his lawyer. Poor Bateman, he’s been trained and brought up to treat life as a video game, beats the game and gets bored and then pushes the boundaries out further and further until he realises, to his sheer astonishment, that there are no boundaries. He realises he is a law unto himself. No one will punish him.
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