The Rules of Attraction
The Rules of Attraction film poster
Directed by	Roger Avary
Produced by	Greg Shapiro
Written by	Novel: Bret Easton Ellis Screenplay: Roger Avary
Starring	James van der Beek Shannyn Sossamon Ian Somerhalder Kip Pardue Jessica Biel
Music by	tomandandy
Cinematography	Robert Brinkmann
Editing by	Sharon Rutter
Distributed by	Lions Gate Films
Release date(s)	11 October, 2002
Running time	110 mins
Country	USA
Language	English
Budget	4,000,000 USD
Followed by	American Psycho
IMDb profile

The Rules of Attraction (2002) is a dark satirical film based on the novel of the same name by Bret Easton Ellis. It was directed by Roger Avary and stars James Van Der Beek, Shannyn Sossamon, Ian Somerhalder, Jessica Biel, Kip Pardue and Clare Kramer. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (600x893, 129 KB) Summary US Poster of Rules of Attraction film Licensing This image is of a movie poster or title card, and the copyright for it is most likely owned by either the publisher of the movie or the studio... Roger Avary, photographed for Score Magazine at the Hotel Costes K, Paris. ... Bret Easton Ellis (born March 7, 1964 in Los Angeles, California) is an American author. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Shannon Marie Sossamon (born October 3, 1978), better known as Shannyn Sossamon, is an American actress, musician, dancer and mother. ... Ian Joseph Somerhalder (born December 8, 1978) is an American actor, male fashion model and producer. ... Kip Pardue (born Kevin Ian Pardue September 23, 1976 in Atlanta, Georgia) is an actor and model. ... Jessica Claire Biel (born March 3, 1982) is an American actress and former fashion model best known for appearing in several Hollywood films such as Summer Catch, the remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Illusionist, as well as for her early television role of Mary Camden in the... A musical group, founded in the late 80s in NYC, chiefly known for their work in film scores and television commercials. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Lions Gate Films. ... is the 284th day of the year (285th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... This is a list of film-related events in 2002. ... English is a West Germanic language originating in England, and the first language for most people in Australia, Canada, the Commonwealth Caribbean, Ireland, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States of America (also commonly known as the Anglosphere). ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... This is a list of film-related events in 2002. ... 1867 edition of the satirical magazine Punch, a British satirical magazine, ground-breaking on popular literature satire. ... The Rules of Attraction is a novel by Bret Easton Ellis published in 1987 and made into a film by the same name in 2002. ... Bret Easton Ellis (born March 7, 1964 in Los Angeles, California) is an American author. ... Roger Avary, photographed for Score Magazine at the Hotel Costes K, Paris. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Shannon Marie Sossamon (born October 3, 1978), better known as Shannyn Sossamon, is an American actress, musician, dancer and mother. ... Ian Joseph Somerhalder (born December 8, 1978) is an American actor, male fashion model and producer. ... Jessica Claire Biel (born March 3, 1982) is an American actress and former fashion model best known for appearing in several Hollywood films such as Summer Catch, the remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Illusionist, as well as for her early television role of Mary Camden in the... Kip Pardue (born Kevin Ian Pardue September 23, 1976 in Atlanta, Georgia) is an actor and model. ... Clare Kramer. ...

Taglines

• There Are No Rules.
• We all run on instinct.
• Past Perfect. Present Tense. Future Uncertain.

Plot

The film takes place at the fictional Camden College, a liberal arts school in northeastern New Hampshire (the film was actually shot at the University of Redlands in California). In the history of education, the seven liberal arts comprise two groups of studies, the trivium and the quadrivium. ... Official language(s) English Capital Concord Largest city Manchester Area  Ranked 46th  - Total 9,350 sq mi (24,217 km²)  - Width 68 miles (110 km)  - Length 190 miles (305 km)  - % water 4. ... The University of Redlands is a private liberal arts and sciences university located in Redlands, California. ...

The opening sequence introduces the three main characters - Lauren (Sossamon), Paul (Somerhalder), and Sean (Van Der Beek), in turn. They are three college students at an "End of the World" party, and although they don't interact at the party, they share a certain apathy about the situations they end up in^{[citation needed]}. Lauren, previously a virgin, is raped while being filmed by a minor character who in a subtle way instructs the rapist to sodomize her. This ultimate humiliation^{[citation needed]} culminated when the rapist vomits on her back. Paul is gay bashed by a football jock whom he had mistaken for gay. (Although in the scene it is hinted that he may have been deeply closeted.) , and Sean recalls (in the third person), "he couldn't remember the last time he had sex sober". After the introduction of each character, time moves backwards until we meet the next character. Essentially we observe the party from three different points of view. In film, a sequence is a series of scenes which form a distinct narrative unit, usually connected either by unity of location or unity of time. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... The persecution of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgendered individuals is the practice of attacking a person, usually physically, because they are or are perceived to be lesbian, gay or transgender. ... For the small enclosed storage space, also known as a cupboard, see closet. ... Grammatical person, in linguistics, is deictic reference to the participant role of a referent, such as the speaker, the addressee, and others. ...

The story then jumps back in time, and for the remainder of the film we follow the lives of the characters and learn how they came to know each other. Throughout the film, the characters (Sean in particular) exude somewhat of an indifference^{[citation needed]} toward the people and events around them. For example, despite being set at a college, not one of the characters is ever shown attending a class.

Characters

• Sean Bateman - A drug dealer who decides he is in love with Lauren. He eventually sleeps with her roommate, Lara (Biel), although he doesn't feel that this makes him unfaithful - "I only did it with her because I'm in love with you." Sean differs from his contemporaries in that he was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth. He seems to want to both fit in and feed his intense self loathing.
• Lauren Hynde - A virgin who is saving herself for Victor (Pardue), her ex-boyfriend, who is traveling through Europe. She develops feelings for Sean which dissipate when she discovers him in bed with her roommate.
• Paul Denton - An ex-boyfriend of Lauren's who has since recognized he's bisexual. He develops a sexual attraction to Sean, who eventually rejects him.
• Lara Holleran - Lauren's sexually promiscuous roommate, who, after sleeping with Sean, ends up with Victor. Deliberately insults Sean by pointing out that he "fucked up" with Lauren by sleeping with her, only to receive a punch in retribution.
• Victor Johnson - Lauren's promiscuous ex-boyfriend who, upon returning to school from his trip to Europe, cannot remember who she is.
• Rupert - A high strung, hotheaded drug dealer in business with Sean, who owes the unstable Rupert (the result of much drug taking) a serious debt.
• Mitchell Allen - A weaselly cohort who seems to idolize brutish Victor. He sponges off Sean for the drugs.
• Mark - A coked out student who owes Sean money for drugs, he is played by Wonder Years star Fred Savage.

In Roman times, Vestal Virgins were strictly celibate or they were punished by death. ... In human sexuality, bisexuality describes a man or woman having a sexual orientation to persons of either or both sexes (a man or woman who sexually likes both sexes; people who are sexually and/or romantically attracted to both males and females). ... For other uses, see Europe (disambiguation). ... The Wonder Years was a television show set in the 1960s and early 1970s. ... Frederick Aaron Savage (born July 9, 1976) is an Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award-nominated American actor and television and film director. ...

Trivia

Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines. The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.

• The principal photography for the End of the world party scene at the begining and the end of the film was shot on September 11 2001.

• Sean Bateman's brother Patrick Bateman, the main character of American Psycho, appears in the Rules of Attraction novel, but not in the film. Bret Easton Ellis, the novel's author, revealed in an interview that director Roger Avary asked Christian Bale (who portrayed Patrick in the film adaptation of American Psycho) to reprise his role as Patrick Bateman. Bale turned down the offer, and Avary asked Ellis himself to portray Bateman. Ellis refused, stating that he "thought it was such a terrible and gimmicky idea", and Avary eventually shot the scenes with Casper Van Dien as Patrick. The scenes, however, despite being Avary's favorites^{[citation needed]}, were ultimately cut from the final version of the film for reasons of length. A snippet of this scene can be seen in one of the "iTeasers" that Avary cut and released onto the Internet during the film's initial theatrical release. Patrick is still referenced, however, when Sean tells his drug dealers that "his brother" wired the money he owes them into his account. When Paul Denton calls Sean on the phone, Sean asks if the caller is Patrick. When Paul asks who Patrick is, Sean says it's none of his business.

• The film was one of the first studio motion pictures to be edited using Final Cut Pro. Using a beta version of FCP 3, it proved to the film industry^{[citation needed]} that successful 3:2 pulldown matchback to 24fps could be achieved with a consumer off-the-shelf product and that high-priced Avids were no longer necessary. Roger Avary, the film's director became the spokesperson for FCP, appearing in print ads worldwide. His advocacy of the product gave confidence^{[citation needed]} to mainstream editors like Walter Murch that the product was ready for "prime time."

• Eric Stoltz's character, Lance Lawson, is named for the former owner of Video Archives, the Manhattan Beach video rental store where director Roger Avary and Quentin Tarantino both worked during the 1980s. This marked the second time that Stoltz had played a character named for Lawson, following his turn as the drug dealer "Lance" in Pulp Fiction. Tarantino also worked Lawson's name into the script for True Romance, as the name of Clarence's boss at the comic book store who paid Patricia Arquette's prostitute character Alabama to sleep with Clarence (played by Christian Slater) as a birthday gift.

• Jessica Biel's line "Rusty Pipes" while snorting cocaine is identical to the one another girl speaks in the exact same situation in another adaptation of Ellis's novels (Less Than Zero).

• The film contains a number of palindromes encoded into it, from the palindromic music compositions of tomandandy, to the year of the films release, 2002, to its very structure; with reference^{[citation needed]} to the method in which the film began and ended.

• Prop comic Carrot Top recorded a commentary track for the DVD of the film. He had no involvement with the making of the film and states during the commentary that the reason he did it was because "they couldn't find anyone else to do it". It's a rather bizarre commentary^{[citation needed]}, almost as if Carrot Top had not seen the film prior to recording the commentary. He often comments on the hotness of each actress, begging Eric Stoltz for work everytime he's on screen, and even occasionally singing along with the songs in the film.

• A poster for the Pass Out Of Existence album by Cleveland, OH Heavy Metal band Chimaira appears in the scene where Mark lays on his bed and shoots heroin. The song "Bloodlust" from Chimaira's self-titled album is based on American Psycho.

Image File history File links Broom_icon. ... 9/11 redirects here. ... Christian Bale as Patrick Bateman Patrick Bateman is a fictional character, the protagonist and narrator of the novel American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis and its film adaptation. ... For other uses, see American Psycho (disambiguation). ... Bret Easton Ellis (born March 7, 1964 in Los Angeles, California) is an American author. ... Roger Avary, photographed for Score Magazine at the Hotel Costes K, Paris. ... Christian Charles Philip Bale (also known professionally as Christian Morgan Bale; born 30 January 1974) is a British[2][3] method actor who is known for his roles in the films American Psycho, Shaft, Equilibrium, The Machinist, Batman Begins and The Prestige, among others. ... Christian Bale as Patrick Bateman Patrick Bateman is a fictional character, the protagonist and narrator of the novel American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis and its film adaptation. ... Casper Robert Van Dien, Jr. ... Final Cut Pro is a professional non-linear editing system developed by Apple Inc. ... Eric Stoltz (born September 30, 1961) is a Golden Globe-nominated American actor. ... Video Archives is a video rental store located on Manhattan Beach, California. ... Quentin Jerome Tarantino (born March 27, 1963) is an American film director, actor, and Oscar winning screenwriter. ... Patricia T Arquette (born April 8, 1968) is an Emmy Award-winning and a Golden Globe Award-nominated American actress. ... Christian Slater (born August 18, 1969) is an American actor. ... A palindrome is a word, phrase, number or any other sequence of units (like a strand of DNA) which has the property of reading the same in either direction (the adjustment of spaces between letters is generally permitted). ... A musical group, founded in the late 80s in NYC, chiefly known for their work in film scores and television commercials. ... Scott Thompson (born February 25, 1965[1] in Cocoa Beach, FL) known by his stage name Carrot Top, is an American prop comedian famous for his thick, curly red hair and often self-parodying style of comedy. ... Pass Out of Existence is the first studio album by Chimaira, released on October 2, 2001. ... Heavy metals, in chemistry, are chemical elements of a particular range of atomic weights. ... Chimaira are a metal band from Cleveland, Ohio. ...

See also

• Less Than Zero
• American Psycho
• Glamorama

Less Than Zero is a novel by Bret Easton Ellis, published in 1985. ... For other uses, see American Psycho (disambiguation). ... Glamorama is a novel by Bret Easton Ellis. ...

External links

• The Rules of Attraction at the Internet Movie Database
• The Rules of Attraction at Empire Magazine
• The Rules of Attraction at The Movie Spoiler
• The Rules of Attraction at Rotten Tomatoes
• The Rules of Attraction at Box Office Mojo
• L.A. Weekly Interview with Avary
• "The Rules of Attraction" at The Village Voice