An excellent piece of writing. I still don't like the film (unlike Carlito's Way, which I love), but from a technical standpoint it is well put together by De Palma. I get the excess is the point, but as you rightly say, the whole thing feels like an exercise in extreme unpleasantness, without anyone having any redeeming features, etc, so it's a film I find repugnant and alienating. I don't really think it is saying something profound about the dark side of the American Dream (unlike, say, Goodfellas or The Godfather). I think it may set out to implicitly condemn narcissistic excess, but I would argue that it might actually glorify it uninentionally, given the response from some people I've met.