Between the scarily convincing performance by Bale and the darkly oppressive atmosphere, The Machinist earns its style and ending

Rating: 7/10 (15 August 2019)

The big twist for me watching The Machinist is that it wasn't a direct descendant of Fight Club. Though it has a distinctly dark, noir all-is-not-what it seems tone, it doesn't actually rest solely on a big twist to flip your character perspective; instead, it's an intimately psychological horror where you don't realize exactly why the outlook is so bleak until the ending. It's finally revealed that the cause of his insomnia and his bleak outlook is guilt over killing a child. The places we go in his mind are carefully crafted, clearly feeling too coincidental to be real but unsure of how they fit together or where his mental state is. The movie is effective first and foremost because of Bale - yes, he lost 60 pounds for the role which is crazy, but he also sells the exhausted, perpetually doubtful and dour character impeccably. The fish motif really didn't do a ton for me, but there were lots of great hints about his past transgressions, like the parallel between the carnival and his childhood picture with his mom, or that opening scene unraveling a body that doesn't make sense at the time, or the fact that his car had been totaled a year ago. The plot is fine, a good but not great twist and not a ton of deep commentary, but Bale's performance and the way the cinematography and tone force you into his unhinged yet hopelessly melancholy frame of mind make it a good movie easily worth watching.