Reese Witherspoon saw plenty of Toronto when fiance Ryan Philippe was here filming 54. Now she's due back to work on the controversial American Psycho, and Ryan presumably will be here to sightsee.

"I play Evelyn, Patrick Bateman's fiancee," says Witherspoon, who'll be seen next week in Cruel Intentions, the lurid teen adaptation of Dangerous Liaisons with Sarah Michelle Geller. Bateman is the serial-killer protagonist of the Bret Easton Ellis book, a reviled tome, the filming of which has infuriated local victims' rights groups.

Leonardo DiCaprio said yes and then had a change of heart about starring in the movie. Those who've said yes and are sticking by it include Christian Bale, Willem Dafoe, Samantha Mathis, Jared Leto, Oliver Platt and Chloe Sevigny.

What about Witherspoon? "Obviously, I had to be sure about this. I read the book and had a long discussion with (director) Mary Harron, and we had a sort of similar view about the film.

"To me, the movie is a dark satire of a male response to the sexual liberation of women in the early '80s. That women didn't need men was a new thing for these young men who were doing everything possible to be impressive and wearing these designer shoes and having these wonderful apartments and spending this money and women just didn't give a sh--.

"The story is about this man who responds to inadequacies with the only control he has in his life, which is to put women in these horrible, compromising positions.

"Mary has this wonderful black tone in mind, and she really knows what she's talking about. I really think she's going to pull this off."

"It's definitely toned down from the book," Witherspoon says. "I don't think we could have had all that rampant killing and still maintain a story."


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