Christian Bale has travelled far from his humble beginnings in the tiny county district of Pembrokshire, Wales. He’s been to the past, the future, to Gotham and back and he’s taken us along for the journey every step of the way.
Bale’s been at the acting game for many years now, with his first notable international appearance being as Jim ‘Jamie’ Graham in Steven Spielberg’s Empire of the Sun in 1987. The rest is not quite history, but that was certainly a healthy start.
It wasn’t what you’d call a meteoric rise to prominence. Nearly two decades isn’t exactly a short career but over those years Bale has been continually honing his craft down to razor sharpness, to the point that today, he could easily be considered one of Hollywood’s top personalities.
From Bateman to Batman, Christian Bale has provided us with some truly mind-blowing performances across his illustrious career; he’s also provided us with some less than great ones, albeit not quite so many. And with the world’s eyes turning on him once again with the recent release of The Dark Knight Rises, this list just felt right.
So let’s skip the chatter and get right to the prestige – five of Bale’s on-screen performances that blew our mind… and five that didn’t.
Want to write about the stuff you're passionate about and have your work read by an audience of over 10 million a month? Click here to become a contributor.
18 Comments
I’d go Rescue Dawn over 3:10 to Yuma, agree with what you say about it, though would say his performance was good rather than great. Actually his run between the Batmans is pretty darn good, Harsh Times, New World, Rescue Dawn, Prestige, Yuma. American Psycho is still my favourite though.
Yeah, you really can’t go wrong with his output of recent years eh?
I hate to nit-pick, but it was Melissa Leo who won the Oscar for best supporting actress for The Fighter, not Amy Adams.
Duly noted ;)
Though I disagree that he was bad in The Dark Knight (it’s your own opinion after all) I’ll just defend his voice in it; I remember Christopher Nolan saying that he had it edited to sound the way it did in post-production to make it more rough and deep. Christian performed the same voice he did in Batman Begins, but he had no control over how they edited it.
I think he has a habit of over acting at times, how serious he takes he’s job comes through on screen in a bad way sometimes. Meaning Terminator Salvation/Public Enemies in particular.
Good to see The Machinist at the top, and i too think he’s rather good in the Batmans.
I read through this going ‘he won’t put TDK as number 1, he should, but he won’t’ and you did. Happy about that; whilst I don’t think he was awful, he was such a step down from Batman Begins but then again, Batman Begins was his movie, The Dark Knight was Heath Ledger’s and he couldn’t stand up next to that huge persona.
He made up for it in TDKR though, stunning.
Can’t wait to see it, going this evening I think!
I agree though I would say the script is most to blame. Bruce Wayne is just a rather boring character in TDK where as he is the most important one in Batman Begins and thankfully in TDKR. Batman is really a tool not a character, he turns up and fights. Bruce is the heart of the character and in TDK he is just over shadowed not by Heath Ledger but by Aaron Eckhart. Yes Heath Ledger stole every scene he was in but narratively the real hero is Harvey Dent. The whole film is about Harvey Dent, his rise and fall. Batman and The Joker are just on either side of him. It makes for a great movie but it wasn’t as satisfying as BB and TDKR as a Batman movie.
Funnily enough, have people on my Facebook adamant that it should be in the 5 best! It definitely isn’t one of his best performances that’s for damn sure.
You seem to suggest that the Machinist is a great performance simply because Bale lost a lot of weight for the role. Whilst this definitely helped create the impression of a haunted and troubled character, such an act on its own does not make a great performance.
As it happens, I think that the Machinist was a very good performance, but this article should look deeper at what made it good, rather than just focusing upon the sensational, and rather obvious aspect of his weight loss.
Rescue Dawn should really be in his best performances, especially over 3:10 to Yuma. Very surprised to see it left out.
Am I the only one that loves Equilibrium?
No no, I love Equilibrium too….it was a close call, put it that way.
That Dark Knight spoof couldn’t be more unfunny if it tried.
What about his 1st? Empire of the Sun? damn good flick
When I want to see Christian Bale kick-ass I turn to Equilibrium.
Kind of ironic given Bale plays my favourite superhero Batman. There are some great moments in Batman Begins (“Swear to me”).
In Dark Knight every time Batman gets near the Joker Batman falls over like a wind-up doll – as though the Joker is kryptonite. I would have liked to see the Joker do some nasty tricks to incapacitate Batman, rather than have Batman fall over on this bike, or walk into a net. Pathetic.
Christian Bale can do great fighting sequences – just needs good choreography, good camera angles and good editing.
In the ads for Dark Knight the Joker says something about liking Rachel cos she has a bit of fight, to which Batman appears and says “Then you’re going to love me”. In the ad they show Batman while he says this, but in the movie the camera is still on the Joker. Just bad editing in the movie.
Love American Psycho. When he peels off the facial mask and says Patrick Bateman simply doesn’t exist – wow. A rare moment in cinema history.
But what about The Prestige?!?!?