If films like last year's "Being John Malkovich," "Fight Club," "Magnolia" and the newly released "American Psycho" are any indication; the current state of filmmaking is looking pretty good.

Not since the '70s have American audiences seen such an illustrious crop of unique and exciting films.

Granted, "American Psycho" was not made in Hollywood with a $100 million budget, but it did get made for $7.5 million by Lions Gate Films, which also released last year's "Dogma."

With "American Psycho," director Mary Harron ("I Shot Andy Warhol") and co-writer Guinevere Turner (adapting a much-maligned Brett Easton Ellis novel), have given us a cold, dark satirical look into the blackness that resides within the image culture, as well as the first truly memorable film of the year.

"American Psycho" portrays, with playful meticulousness, the egotistic world of young and affluent Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale): Wall Street V.P. by day, vicious serial killer with a penchant for outrageous combinations of sex and hyper-violence by night. Through this well-sketched character, "American Psycho" offers a fierce, social commentary about the excesses that characterized the 1980s.

On the surface, the well-groomed, conservative and conventional Bateman appears to be the ideal late '80s yuppie. But underneath the surface lurks . . . well, nothing. The film plays with the idea that nobody has time for emotion in a society driven by materialism. Bateman is not even remotely contemplative of his brutal crimes. His murders are merely a natural extension of his cutthroat lifestyle (at one point, he puts on a poncho so blood won't splatter on his designer suit). Bateman is young, rich, good-looking and psychotic. He is the very essence of jealousy and greed that was corporate America.

Harron has created something truly original: a character study of a man who is more a collection of ideas than a unique personality unto his own. Her direction unflinchingly captures the decadence of this big-cash world, where young businessmen are interchangeable and their jobs nondescript.

The film will undoubtedly anger those seeking a traditional motive to Bateman's crimes or a sense of resolution; but by keeping the film loosely plotted as well as gorgeous in appearance, Harron drives the point of the film home in both idea and design.

She and cinematographer Andrzej Sekula handle the picture's violent sequences skillfully, making them genuinely jarring without allowing them to overwhelm the film's satirical points. This is one of the few recent black comedies that really works, delivering laughs and shivers in about equal measure. Indeed, an undercurrent of nasty humor is maintained even at the most brutal moment.

The killing of fellow broker Paul Allen (Jared Leto), in particular, is the most hysterically funny killing imaginable, all done to Huey Lewis & The News' "Hip To Be Square." Lewis may have pulled his song off the official soundtrack CD, but it remains in the movie and is absolutely essential to understanding how nuts Bateman is becoming as he sees his illusions of power shattered.

In another scene, which is set up previously by a short clip of "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre," Bateman, naked and splattered in blood, chases a prostitute through the halls of a seemingly empty New York City apartment building, all the while clutching his wailing chainsaw. While this may sound a bit grisly, this scene, as it is presented, is nothing short of hilarious in its over-the-top B-grade horror movie aesthetics. Indeed, perversely and pointedly, "American Psycho" is repeatedly funny.

Much of the film's humor and success is due to Christian Bale's all-or-nothing performance as Patrick Bateman. Presenting him as wonderfully off-the-wall, Bale ("Little Women," "Velvet Goldmine") manages to play Bateman to the point of absurdity without making the character so ludicrous that he becomes irrelevant (one can only imagine what a totally different effect would have resulted had Leonardo DiCaprio, as originally suggested, taken the role).

And while Bateman, whose Wall Street specialty is "murders and executions," (which is misheard as "mergers and acquisitions"), remains consistently amusing, Bale actually gives an oddly insightful performance. On the verge of a breakdown, Bateman never cries, not because he's holding back the tears, but because he honestly can't get the emotions to happen. There's simply no one there.

The movie is also helped by some effective supporting roles. Reese Witherspoon ("Election") is Patrick's princess-like fiancée, who smothers him with baby talk and attention. Deep down Patrick hates her, preferring the broken-down and medicated despair of Courtney (Samantha Mathis), an emotional wreck and suicide waiting-to-happen. Chloe Sevigny ("Boys Don't Cry") is Patrick's sweet, tentative secretary, who during a date mistakes his fears of losing control for tender declarations of sexual attraction. And Willem Dafoe ("Platoon") is solid as an incredibly likable private investigator.

Some will argue that, like its protagonist, "American Psycho" has a lot on the surface, but not much underneath. The picture may lose its footing toward the close, and its observations might not be exactly profound, but it's not merely an exercise in style — it has ideas, however muddled they may be.

It is being praised by some as the darkest satire to hit the screens since "A Clockwork Orange." Others, however, are calling it "misogynistic" and "utterly deplorable." Whatever the case may be, one thing's for sure: "American Psycho," much like "A Clockwork Orange," is destined to become a cult-classic.

--four out of five shamrocks--

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