Sharpen your axe and dust off your Huey Lewis and the News CDs—there’s an American Psycho remake in the works. But who will be the new Patrick Bateman? That decision largely rests with Luca Guadagnino, who, as per a recent announcement, has signed up to direct a new version of Bret Easton Ellis’s grotesque but enrapturing novel.
With Hollywood’s run of remakes and reboots still going strong, it was only a matter of time before an American Psycho remake happened. The original 2000 film starred Christian Bale as the murderous banker, and his deliciously deranged portrayal of Bateman has since spawned countless memes; in recent years the film has become beloved by alt-right-adjacent “sigma grindset” accounts that celebrate toxic masculinity with varying degrees of irony.
The official announcement describes this new film as “a whole new interpretation” of the book, rather than hemming too closely with the first film, which was directed by Mary Harron. Which is just as well—trying to out-Bale Bale is a fool’s errand. Given Luca Guadagnino’s tendency towards both visual gorgeousness (Call Me by Your Name, Challengers) and bonkers horror (Suspiria, Bones and All), we can expect something that leans hard into the book’s surrealness—as well as offering a new, Luca-fied take on finance-bro style, which Harron’s film nailed so well.
So: Who will Guadagnino pick to be play his version of the bloodthirsty financier? The field is wide open. Not only do our current leading men have a pronounced hankering for playing weirdos (of which more below), but the physical requirements of the role are pretty loose too. A Bale-style beefcake is as just as plausible as a more elfin actor.
And though, in the original film, Bateman’s WASPy whiteness is an essential part of his dark character, Guadagnino could well dive into the modern, multicultural finance world and pick an actor of color instead. Here are the main contenders; let’s hope their business cards are up to scratch.
Timotheé Chalamet
The effectiveness with which he injected a wide-eyed fanaticism into Paul Atreides for Dune: Part Two signals he could easily trade a stillsuit for Wall Street pinstripes. He’s also a pillar of the Guadagnino cinematic universe already, via lead roles in Call Me By Your Name and Bones and All. Given the latter involved full-blown cannibalism, his stomach should be strong enough for the book’s gruesome contents.
