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American Psycho is a 2000 film by Mary Harron, a film adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis's novel of the same name. The film stars Christian Bale as Patrick Bateman, with Jared Leto, Josh Lucas, Justin Theroux, Bill Sage, Chloë Sevigny, Reese Witherspoon, Willem Dafoe, and Samantha Mathis.

Mary Harron, who had previously directed I Shot Andy Warhol (based on the story of Valerie Solanas), directed the film and co-wrote its screenplay with Guinevere Turner. This screenplay was selected over three others, including one by Ellis himself. Turner claims Ellis' only complaint with the film was Bateman's moonwalk before killing Paul Allen. In the novel, Patrick Bateman's favorite bands are Genesis, Huey Lewis and the News and Whitney Houston. Three distinct, and entire chapters, are devoted to each. Virtually every line in the film, including voice-overs, are taken nearly verbatim from Ellis' novel. One of the few discrepancies is that several names from the book were changed for the film; for instance Paul Owen became Paul Allen and Tim Price became Tim Bryce. In an interview, Mary Harron claimed to be distressed upon discovering that Paul Allen was a high-powered figure in business and technology and that she meant nothing by the use of his name.

American Psycho, as other works by Ellis, has connecting characters from his other books which subsequently do not appear at all in the film version. With the exception of the character of Vanden, whom Evelyn (Reese Witherspoon) introduces as her cousin at Espace, is also from Rules of Attraction. Patrick Bateman's brother Sean from Rules of Attraction is in the chapter entitled Birthday/Brother, but is mentioned nowhere in the film; However, Patrick is mentioned by Sean in both the book and the film version of Rules of Attraction.

Many people in the film industry have said that the novel was "un-filmable" because of its graphic violence and sexual content. During the early stage of pre-production, many actors, directors and crew members were considered to take on the film adaptation. Harron and Bale were originally set to make the film, but Leonardo DiCaprio expressed interest in playing the lead. Production company Lions Gate Entertainment issued a press release that DiCaprio would star, after which Harron walked off the project, and Oliver Stone subsequently expressed interest in directing the film. When both DiCaprio and Stone dropped the project, Harron and Bale returned to the film.

Christian Bale spent several months working out by himself, and then three hours a day with a trainer during pre-production, in order to achieve the proper physique for the narcissistic Bateman.

For the edited DVD version and R-rated cinematic version of the film in the United States, the producers excised approximately 18 seconds of footage from a scene featuring Bateman having a threesome with two prostitutes. Some dialogue was also edited: Bateman orders a prostitute, Christy, to bend over so that another, Sabrina, can "see your asshole", which was edited to "see your ass". The unedited version also shows Bateman receiving oral sex from Christy. Some events that Bateman mentions in the phone message to his lawyer are events that transpired in the book, but not in the film.