Daily Dialogue — October 25, 2016

INT. BATEMAN’S APARTMENT- MORNING

TRACKING through a huge white apartment with floor-to-ceiling windows looking out over Manhattan. It’s decorated in expensive, minimalist high style: marble floors, a huge white sofa, a large Baselitz painting and expensive electronic equipment — the feel is oddly impersonal.

INT. BATEMAN’S BATHROOM — CONTINUOUS

Bateman walks into his Bathroom, urinates while trying to see his reflection in a poster for Les Miserables above his toilet.

BATEMAN (VO): I live in the American Gardens Building on West 81st Street, on the eleventh floor… My name is Patrick Bateman. I’m twenty-seven years old.

INT. BATEMAN’S KITCHEN — CONTINUOUS

Bateman opens the refrigerator and takes out a plastic ice-pack; he wraps it around his face.

BATEMAN (VO): I believe in taking care of myself: in a balanced diet, in a rigorous exercise routine. In the morning, if my face is a little puffy, I’ll put on an ice pack while doing my stomach crunches. I can do a thousand now.

INT. BATEMAN’S LIVING ROOM — CONTINUOUS

Bateman does his morning stretching exercises in the Living Room wearing the ice pack.

INT. BATEMAN’S BATHROOM — CONTINUOUS

Bateman is luxuriating in the shower, scrubbing his body, admiring his muscles, pampering himself.

BATEMAN (VO): After I remove the ice-pack I use a deep pore-cleanser lotion. In the shower I use a water-activated gel cleanser… Then a honey-almond body scrub. And on the face, an exfoliating gel scrub.

AT BATHROOM MIRROR —

Bateman stands in front of the mirror applying a gel facial masque.

BATEMAN (VO): Then I apply an herb mint facial mask which I leave on for ten minutes while I prepare the rest of my routine.

Bateman opens the door of a mirrored cabinet, which is stocked with immaculate rows of skin care products. He begins selecting bottles jars and brushes, laying them in readiness on the counter.

BATEMAN (VO): I always use an aftershave lotion with little or no alcohol because alcohol dries your face out and makes you look older. Then moisturizer, then an anti-aging eye balm followed by a final moisturizing “protective” lotion…

Bateman stares into the mirror. The masque has dried, giving his face a strange distorted look as if it has been wrapped in plastic. He begins slowly peeling the gel masque off his face.

BATEMAN (VO): There is an idea of a Patrick Bateman, some kind of abstraction. But there is no real me… Only an entity, something illusory. And though I can hide my cold gaze, and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours, and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable, I simply am not there.

— American Psycho (2000), screenplay by Mary Harron and Guinevere Turner, novel by Bret Easton Ellis

The Daily Dialogue theme next week: Discipline. Today’s suggestion by Gregory Netterville.

Trivia: During production, Christian Bale followed the morning routine that his character Patrick Bateman describes toward the beginning of the film.

Dialogue On Dialogue: Commentary by Gregory: “Seeing as you mentioned self-discipline… Even the unhinged pay attention to the details and follow a strict code.”