One can’t deny the dubious appeal of the spectacle of the skin-and-bone Bale, quite possibly endangering his health for the sake of his art.
The Machinist (2004)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:131
Fresh:98
Rotten:33
Average Rating:6.6/10
Consensus: A suspenseful low-budget thriller where Christian Bale completely inhabits his role.
Runtime: 1 hr 43 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: Christian Bale delivers one of cinema's most sacrificial performances in Brad Anderson's mesmerizing thriller. Written by Scott Kosar (2003's THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE), THE MACHINIST takes place... Christian Bale delivers one of cinema's most sacrificial performances in Brad Anderson's mesmerizing thriller. Written by Scott Kosar (2003's THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE), THE MACHINIST takes place in a bleak and nondescript American city, where Trevor Reznick (Bale) is quite literally withering away to nothing. During the day Trevor works in a colorless industrial factory, while at night he seeks refuge in the bed of a tender prostitute, Stevie (Jennifer Jason Leigh). For reasons unknown even to Trevor, he hasn't been able to sleep for an entire year. In the process, he has shed over sixty pounds, making him look like a walking skeleton. After an accident at the factory costs Trevor his job, he finds himself tracking a mysterious figure that may or may not, in fact, provide some answers to his confusion. Meanwhile, he begins to connect with a pretty airport waitress, Marie (Aitana Sanchez-Gijon), who shows Trevor some much-needed sympathy. By the time the film builds to its revelatory conclusion, it becomes quite clear just what has been tormenting Trevor all along. Anderson and Kosar's vision is brought to spectacular life by cinematographer Xavi Gimenez and composer Roque Banos, whose haunting atmospherics recall the best work of Alfred Hitchcock. And then, of course, there is Bale, whose performance is as terrifying, brave, and devastating as the screen has ever seen. [More]
Starring: Christian Bale, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Aitana Sanchez-Gijon, Michael Ironside
Starring: Christian Bale, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Aitana Sanchez-Gijon, Michael Ironside, John Sharian
Director: Brad Anderson
Director: Brad Anderson
Screenwriter: Scott Kosar
Producer: Julio Fernandez
Composer: Roque Banos
Studio: Paramount Classics
Reviews for The Machinist
Anderson struggles to maintain an emotional connection, but he crafts a remarkably sure-handed little thriller.
A few scenes into the gloom and you’ll have a good idea what is generally up, if not the specifics, making the journey toward the eventual, inevitable twist fairly one-dimensional.
You'll join the dots in Anderson's thriller within the first five minutes - a real crying shame since Bale deserved much more for his pound -- or 63 -- of flesh.
The performances are nothing short of superb - Bale's skeletal form alone is likely to be the most haunting visual image of the year.
Bale's performance has the emotional weight to substantiate this body-art spectacle, ranging from prickly self-righteousness through panicked self-doubt to morbid self-pity...
The Machinist, in terms of its gimmicky, save-the-conceit structure, is a bit like the self-consciously clever Memento but not even half as fun.
replacing phrase "going De Niro" with the phrase "going Bale" in many vocabularies
Mark Twain said that Wagner's music isn't as bad as it sounds. The Machinist isn't as good as it looks. But Bale's fever-dream performance is otherworldly great.
Bale is totally convincing, if not especially endearing, as the sleep-challenged title character. If it's true that Oscar can't resist a likable actor in a self-punishing role, this one is going to be hard to top come February.
A relentless and painful reminder of concentration camp terrors and famine relief operations.
Christian Bale delivers one of the most astounding performances of the year in this exceptionally written psychological thriller. **
It would be easy to accuse Bale of a warped kind of egomania if his performance wasn't so mesmerizing.
Anderson definitely has a flair for creating a diffuse sense of fear, paranoia, and mental illness onscreen.
Anderson builds up suspense quite brilliantly, using a deliberate pace that draws the viewer into Trevor's strange world.
The film is admirably atmospheric but it ultimately loses its nerve and is revealed as just another comforting lesson in redemption.
Trevor Reznik. Machinist. Insomniac. A man wracked with guilt who can only find redemption ... in the Twilight Zone.
Although The Machinist may at times seem to be derivative of those films, and is inferior to them, it is nevertheless a harrowing experience for those to whom this sort of story appeals.
Christian Bale gives his best by giving less in this nightmare tale of a machinist who is one tool short of the full set.
A foreboding, noir-bending film of visceral, internalized tension and confusion.
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