What American Psycho and Patrick Bateman’s business cards can teach you about watch collecting.

American Psycho is a watch collecting fable.

In the past many film critics have presumed the story of Patrick Bateman, a super successful Wall Street investment banker and serial killer hobbyist, carried hidden meanings of corporate greed, misogyny and toxic masculinity.

Not so.

It is, in fact, a metaphor for the doomed watch collector.

I shall share with you some of the films lessons…

Comparison may be the thief of Joy, but insecurity drags Joy down a dark alley for a good kicking.

Repeatedly our protagonist, Bateman, struggles in his battle to gain the admiration of his peers. It doesn’t matter that he has a fabulous apartment, a chiselled physique and a Rolex worth every minute of AD grovelling. What matters to him, is business cards (and killing people, but I’ll come to that later).

Throughout the film we see Bateman struggle bitterly with the fact that his colleagues business cards are better than his own. He laments over their more beautiful colouring, the crispness of the embossed font and the tasteful thickness.

Ironically, to the casual onlooker, every card looks exactly the same.

Comparison is something innate to all of us, making it a difficult beast to escape. But for most it doesn’t lead to the entrenched bitterness experienced by Bateman.

Unfortunately for our protagonist, his constant comparing, mixed with his underlying insecurities, and fuelled in turn by a desire for constant superiority, leads to his eventual mental decline… dogs getting kicked to death, cats being fed to cash machines etc.etc…

So, don’t be like Bateman.

Look after your mental health and strive against comparison.

Don’t let your watch get in the way of enjoying your prostitutes.

Ok… this may be a bit of a niche lesson, and only applicable to a small number of watch enthusiasts… but perhaps not…

Bateman enjoys the intimate company of several women in the film, but in one such scene one of the two ladies he is in bed with accidentally rolls over and hits her arm on his watch (a 36mm Rolex Oyster Perpetual Datejust reference 16013, because I know that’s what you were asking yourself, rather than wondering what was going on in the bed… you’re such a watch nerd).

This accidental smack of the watch caused Bateman some annoyance and bad things went down afterwards.

The moral here is to not let your watch be such a worry that you struggle to enjoy the moment/prostitute.

The watch community has your back… until it doesn’t.

As Patrick starts to realise that perhaps moonlighting as a masochistic serial killer isn’t a healthy way to spend the evenings, he starts to try and reach out and confess to those around him, but much to his distress these pleas for help are ignored.

When Bateman tries to rely on his friends and colleagues to hold him accountable, it turns out to be futile.

Analysts of the film say this is representative of the world at large ignoring corporate greed and wrong doings when it is convenient to do so.

I say it is synonymous with the watch communities collusion in our relentless collecting addiction.

If you need someone to normalise your massive watch spending, agree with you that buying 3 watches in 24 hours is a perfectly legitimate life choice or cheer at your carefully crafted wrist shots… the watch community has got you.

But if you need someone to tell you the Blackbay 54 and 58 ARE THE SAME WATCH, YOU DON’T NEED BOTH, or that you absolutely cannot justify another dress watch when your version of ‘smart’ is the shirt with just the one hole… then that’s where your significant other is needed.

Conclusion:

Nobody likes axe murderers or watch enthusiasts who take it all a bit too seriously.

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Buy the book from Amazon here:

American Psycho

Interestingly Bret Easton Ellis, the author of American Pyscho never wanted it turned into a film as he felt it couldn’t do the book justice.