Very interesting with an impressive Christian Bale

Rating: 8/10 (16 October 2005)

Watching 'The Machinist' I felt a great admiration for Christian Bale who lost 63 pounds for his role as Trevor Reznik, a man who tells a prostitute named Stevie (Jennifer Jason Leigh) he has not slept in a year. The way Bale looks and acts is very impressive, too impressive maybe, since it sometimes takes the attention away form the film itself.
Stevie is one of his friends, Marie (Aitana Sánchez-Gijón) is another. She works as a waitress on the airport and Trevor visits her every day for a cup of coffee and a slice of pie. He works as a machinist where his co-workers are not very fond of him, even less when he causes an accident where one of the other men loses his arm. Trevor was distracted by a person who, according to his superiors, does not even exist. Other strange things occur. Trevor finds little Post-Its with a game of hangman in his kitchen. Who is writing the Post-Its, or do they even exist? Does the man he saw and sees more and more exist? Is Trevor losing his mind?
The final moments explain a lot and some things were a little predictable but I didn't care. The movie for me was more about the journey than its destination. What we get to see is how Trevor is feeling and the ending only provides a reason for that. I was satisfied with the answers the movie gave me. Director Brad Anderson with a lot of help from Bale's performance create a creepy atmosphere around Trevor. The movie therefore is effective and basically that is all I wanted.