Similarities Between American Psycho And Joker

Cinema has always posed as a reflection or “a mirror by which we often see ourselves” (Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, 2016). The art of film has been entertaining the world for decades and helped transform directors' mere ideas into a free-flowing, creative form of media. American Psycho (2000) and Joker (2019) are two movies that accurately reflect and symbolize their audience. The two feature length films explore societal pressures and expectations of post-modern America; while both films share various similarities and parallels, the overall differences in plot, character development, and symbolism clearly make one film subjectively better than the other.

Each film has a niche history that helped construct the finished product. The movie American

In the beginning of American Psycho, 27 year old Patrick Bateman is introduced with an extensive, meticulous morning routine paired with a cryptic monologue which indicates Bateman is not as he seems. This monologue is one of the most crucial parts of the film as it gives immediate insight into how Patrick views himself and foreshadows the plot twist. While Bateman’s character is meant to represent the “Wall Street buccaneers, young conservative activists, art-scene denizens, club-hoppers, rich kids, and rising stars” of the late 1980s, he blatantly states that he is not real, but “some kind of abstraction,” “an entity,” and “something illusory” (Rossinow, 2015, p. 119; Harron, 2000, 0:07:22). In contrast, at the start of Joker, a party clown is seen running down the streets of Gotham and getting beat up by a group of teenagers; the clown is eventually revealed to be 34 year old Arthur Fleck. Viewers learn Arthur suffers from various mental illnesses and a condition that causes him to laugh uncontrollably when he feels nervous. Arthur lives alone with his mother and cares for her while struggling to keep his job; however, as the movie progresses, “the outside world begins to creep in [and their] relationship becomes more cynical and leering” (Van Der Meer,

Patrick kills his colleague, Paul Allen, because he is visibly jealous of his slightly better standard of living; even though Patrick is very wealthy, things like Paul's business card and reservations at fancy restaurants taunt him beyond reasoning. In Joker, Arthur shoots and kills three men beating him up in a subway station. Unlike Patrick, Arthur almost has an actual reason for killing the men; he was defending himself. However, the conflict arises when Arthur realizes that murder and violence makes him feel powerful over others. Throughout both films, viewers are left wondering if the events that took place actually transpired. While Patrick seemingly killed multiple people, including Paul Allen, he finds out that Paul is still alive through a conversation with his lawyer at the end of the movie. It is also revealed in Joker that Arthur imagined several interactions and scenarios in the film, so the ending of the movie and his escape from Arkham Asylum is not