Recall American Psycho - highly original, well-acted, carefully directed, and containing some of the darkest black humour ever committed to film - so for most of us, it was laugh-out-loud funny. Whether you liked it or not, it was also gruesome.
The "exciting and much anticipated sequel" is none of the above. Why was it never in theatres? Because it's horrible.
Mila Kunis is college student Rachael Newman. At the very beginning of the movie we learn that Rachael killed Patrick Bateman (the original psycho) as he was killing Rachael's babysitter. WHAT?! Part of what made the original film so effective was that it left us wondering whether all of the murders had really taken place - it made us uncertain, and then it abruptly ended. Now we're told that yes, it all really happened, and the ever-meticulous Patrick
was killed by a frightened little girl - who, by the way, completely got away with killing him. Preposterous! I wanted to turn the film off right there. Purist that I am, however, I suffered on...
Rachael goes to college, studying criminology under a professor who for 25 years was the FBI's greatest hunter of serial killers. Apparently, when the FBI couldn't figure out who killed Patrick Bateman, their top agent left to pursue a career in teaching. Who decided to cast William Shatner for this role? He teams up with Bad Script to make this character lack any of the coldness, ruthlessness, professionalism, quirkiness, or insight that you'd expect from such a legendary FBI-type.
Rachael wants to become the next great FBI agent so she can make a living catching serial killers. (Naturally, she has harboured an immense hatred of them ever since Patrick Bateman killed her babysitter.) In taking Captain Kirk's class this year, Rachael can apply to become his new Teaching Assistant next year - and 9 out of his 10 Teaching Assistants to date have been selected to study with the FBI.
Naturally, Rachael proceeds to wipe out her competitors for that coveted TA position.
You'd have to be heavily drugged to stop from being offended by how unrealistic this film is. For example, nobody questions Rachael when the boy she went out for dinner with and who later was shouting drunkenly in the hall of her dorm disappears. Nobody notices one character fall out a window. No police question Rachael, and the school is not panicked, even though one student was brutally murdered in the middle of the day in the library. A girl is missing for a few days before anyone notices she's hanging from a noose in her room (there's also, magically, no signs of struggle).
And let's face it, Mila Kunis isn't exactly Schwarzenegger. How the heck does she kill a security guard and a janitor without getting injured herself? Speaking of which, all of the murders in the movie are essentially off-camera - you see one person's legs twitch as he is strangled, you see Rachael's arms rise up to deal the killing blow, but that's it. The only gore is on already-dead bodies: the guard has a knife through his hand. OK. But the janitor has his mop rammed through his mouth and out the back of his skull. Is this Mila Kunis or Jason Voorhees?! How strong and over-the-top is this little woman?
Also ludicrous is the psychiatrist (Geraint Wyn Davies) who, after his first session with Rachael, immediately breaks the law by calling her professor and warning him that one of his students is a textbook psychotic. Both psychiatrist and professor proceed to do absolutely nothing about this. At the end of the film, the psychiatrist seems surprised that Rachael committed all of these murders. He then writes a bestselling book about how Rachael was such an ingenious serial killer.
Midway through the movie there's a laughably pathetic attempt to compare Rachael to Ted Bundy, and to further suggest that she is something unique: intelligent and methodical, yet utterly psychopathic and murdering in a downward spiral of increasing rashness and depravity. Whatever - the writers of this film wouldn't know good plot and character development if The Godfather hit them over the head.
There's also a 'twist' ending that confuses more than it explains, and scores high on the lame and unbelievable factors.
Did I mention that Mila also teams up with Bad Script to create a character who never, not for one single fleeting instant, seems obsessive or manic enough to kill people who stand in her way? She's too casual and composed, even when the script suggests she should start to lose control.
In closing, don't waste your time. Yes, she's crazy. Yes, she kills a bunch of people. Yes, this film manages to ruin itself, AND to try to ruin American Psycho by destroying its catch ending. Yes, it's pretty sad that they couldn't get Christian Bale to return to play Patrick in the brief scene at the beginning. No, you really won't care about the fates of any of the characters - even Rachael. No, no role in this film is sexy, or funny, or interesting, or believable, or has any good lines to deliver. Oh, and a couple of the classroom scenes were shot at the same time, then used for different days - how many times have you seen every student in a class come back the next day wearing the EXACT SAME CLOTHES?
The "exciting and much anticipated sequel" is none of the above. Why was it never in theatres? Because it's horrible.
Mila Kunis is college student Rachael Newman. At the very beginning of the movie we learn that Rachael killed Patrick Bateman (the original psycho) as he was killing Rachael's babysitter. WHAT?! Part of what made the original film so effective was that it left us wondering whether all of the murders had really taken place - it made us uncertain, and then it abruptly ended. Now we're told that yes, it all really happened, and the ever-meticulous Patrick
was killed by a frightened little girl - who, by the way, completely got away with killing him. Preposterous! I wanted to turn the film off right there. Purist that I am, however, I suffered on...
Rachael goes to college, studying criminology under a professor who for 25 years was the FBI's greatest hunter of serial killers. Apparently, when the FBI couldn't figure out who killed Patrick Bateman, their top agent left to pursue a career in teaching. Who decided to cast William Shatner for this role? He teams up with Bad Script to make this character lack any of the coldness, ruthlessness, professionalism, quirkiness, or insight that you'd expect from such a legendary FBI-type.
Rachael wants to become the next great FBI agent so she can make a living catching serial killers. (Naturally, she has harboured an immense hatred of them ever since Patrick Bateman killed her babysitter.) In taking Captain Kirk's class this year, Rachael can apply to become his new Teaching Assistant next year - and 9 out of his 10 Teaching Assistants to date have been selected to study with the FBI.
Naturally, Rachael proceeds to wipe out her competitors for that coveted TA position.
You'd have to be heavily drugged to stop from being offended by how unrealistic this film is. For example, nobody questions Rachael when the boy she went out for dinner with and who later was shouting drunkenly in the hall of her dorm disappears. Nobody notices one character fall out a window. No police question Rachael, and the school is not panicked, even though one student was brutally murdered in the middle of the day in the library. A girl is missing for a few days before anyone notices she's hanging from a noose in her room (there's also, magically, no signs of struggle).
And let's face it, Mila Kunis isn't exactly Schwarzenegger. How the heck does she kill a security guard and a janitor without getting injured herself? Speaking of which, all of the murders in the movie are essentially off-camera - you see one person's legs twitch as he is strangled, you see Rachael's arms rise up to deal the killing blow, but that's it. The only gore is on already-dead bodies: the guard has a knife through his hand. OK. But the janitor has his mop rammed through his mouth and out the back of his skull. Is this Mila Kunis or Jason Voorhees?! How strong and over-the-top is this little woman?
Also ludicrous is the psychiatrist (Geraint Wyn Davies) who, after his first session with Rachael, immediately breaks the law by calling her professor and warning him that one of his students is a textbook psychotic. Both psychiatrist and professor proceed to do absolutely nothing about this. At the end of the film, the psychiatrist seems surprised that Rachael committed all of these murders. He then writes a bestselling book about how Rachael was such an ingenious serial killer.
Midway through the movie there's a laughably pathetic attempt to compare Rachael to Ted Bundy, and to further suggest that she is something unique: intelligent and methodical, yet utterly psychopathic and murdering in a downward spiral of increasing rashness and depravity. Whatever - the writers of this film wouldn't know good plot and character development if The Godfather hit them over the head.
There's also a 'twist' ending that confuses more than it explains, and scores high on the lame and unbelievable factors.
Did I mention that Mila also teams up with Bad Script to create a character who never, not for one single fleeting instant, seems obsessive or manic enough to kill people who stand in her way? She's too casual and composed, even when the script suggests she should start to lose control.
In closing, don't waste your time. Yes, she's crazy. Yes, she kills a bunch of people. Yes, this film manages to ruin itself, AND to try to ruin American Psycho by destroying its catch ending. Yes, it's pretty sad that they couldn't get Christian Bale to return to play Patrick in the brief scene at the beginning. No, you really won't care about the fates of any of the characters - even Rachael. No, no role in this film is sexy, or funny, or interesting, or believable, or has any good lines to deliver. Oh, and a couple of the classroom scenes were shot at the same time, then used for different days - how many times have you seen every student in a class come back the next day wearing the EXACT SAME CLOTHES?