What is it about mental illness that people find so captivating? Is it the fact that the character is so different from you that they become more interesting, or could it be the exact opposite? Since the movie “American Psycho”, based off the book by Bret Easton Ellis of the same name, came out, people instantly connected to the troubled character Patrick Bateman. 
Themes of insanity are not subtle in “American Psycho”, as Patrick Bateman has multiple dialogues about his “nightly bloodlust seeping into the day” and multiple scenes where the viewer can’t tell if what they are seeing is even happening, as the movies perspective follows what Bateman is experiencing. For example, during the intense police chase scene, Bateman takes out the pistol he carries in his overcoat pocket and fires off a couple of shots at a parked police car, which erupts in a gigantic fireball. This captivates Bateman and even causes some doubt for him, as he looks down at the pistol in confusion before running away.  
One famous example is the scene where Bateman is standing at an ATM and is prompted to feed it a stray cat by an on-screen popup. It’s obvious that Bateman’s credibility is always in question. In the movie, we see him lure an inebriated Paul Allen, one of Bateman’s biggest annoyances at his workplace, to his apartment where he hacks him to death with an axe. Or does he?  
Patrick Bateman has been diagnosed with many an illness by fans of the book/movie over time, such as Psychosis, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Narcissistic Personality Disorder, Paranoia, and Antisocial Personality Disorder, though it is difficult to really figure it out when one can’t truly communicate with Bateman. 
When looking at Bateman from a medical point of view, it’s very hard to compare him to most mentally ill people in the aspect of how violent he is. In the past couple of decades, academic and medical professionals alike have come to realize that mental illness and violence are not particularly connected. An academic study in 2016 determined that 4% of violence can be associated with serious mental illness alone, and more than 6% of people with mental illness are more likely to experience perpetrated towards them. 
When people watch films like “American Psycho”, they unconsciously run the risk of believing that mentally ill people are inherently violent, which just isn’t the truth. In the book version, Bateman reflects a man consumed by the lavish lifestyle of an investment banker, and becomes corrupted by his desire for murder, but the things he does are more motivated by his jealousy and spite that his surroundings bestowed upon him over time.  
Mental illness is a very common occurrence in modern film and television, and with the widespread use gets misrepresented commonly. American Psycho is a good example of this, but of course, there are many, many more.