Blu-ray Review: THE MACHINIST
Remember when The Machinist came out? Remember what the first thing you heard about it was? I remember: I remember being told that Christian Bale, the actor who had previously wowed me in both Equilibrium and particularly American Psycho, had lost a dangerous amount of weight, and was largely unrecognisable from the beef-cake he had once been. It was a condition I had met before- I remember initially hearing about The Woodsman, and then vividly how quickly the initial buzz about Kevin Bacon's performance evaporated under the pressure of pigeon-holing. Instead of being a film in which Bacon put in some stirling work, in difficult circumstances to say the least, it became the film in which he played a paedophile. No more, no less.
And so it was with The Machinist. I remember not hearing much else about the film beyond Bale's transformation, and I simply wasn't sold. But then, word of mouth changed and I got to see it on DVD. I was met with something of a conundrum.
It is perhaps an unhappy condition of viewing The Machinist, and the one major guiding characteristic that encourages pre-formed ideas about the film, that the single most notable thing it offers is the sight of Christian Bales emaciated, near-starved body. If ever there was a case for the dangerous effect of method acting, then this film has surely got to be called up as a prime bit of evidence for the prosecution. I can understand that Bale was acting with a modicum of restraint in crash-dieting to lose the necessary bulk to play the part, but my overall viewing experience is overshadowed by my concerns that the lasting effect of such monumental weight-loss (and then the subsequent weight gain required to fill the bat suit) must outweigh the temporary accolades of the performance.
What needs to be established is whether the film can live beyond the occasionally distracting influence of its gaunt, sallow-faced star and sparkle for the technically astute bit of film-making that it is often heralded as.
Read on for the rest of the review...I feel decidedly uneasy every time I watch The Machinist, thanks in part to Bales physical appearance, but more appropriately thanks to the cumulative effect of a lot more besides it. Director Brad Anderson shows considerable flair in establishing and building on the uneasy atmosphere that is initially, and rather explosively dependent upon Bale's harrowing look.
If you're not already familiar with the synopsis it flows something like this: Trevor Reznik (Bale) hasn't slept in a year, for reasons not entirely clear. His body and mind wear the scars of his condition and have contributed to his every waking moment being an unrelenting state of confusion, paranoia, guilt, anxiety and terror. The only comfort he knows appears to be in the solace of soliciting with a whore (Jennifer Jason Leigh) and regularly visiting an airport waitress (Aitana Sánchez-Gijó) whose friendliness forms his only real social relationships.
When cryptic notes begin to appear mysteriously in his home and when hallucinations of a large, bald co- worker called Ivan who appears to be invisible to his fellow workers causes a gruesome machine shop injury, Reznik sets out to discover whether there is an elaborate plot to drive him mad or if his failing mind is no more than a aggravated symptom of his insomnia. Unfortunately, the revelations are less than comforting...
The film obviously depends upon the performance of Christian Bale in the lead- whether you are a fan of extreme method acting like this or not, it is hard to deny that Bale's performance is as dependant upon the work he put in before the cameras rolled than upon his famous dramatic screen presence and poise. His frail frame is the perfect tool to bring Reznik to the screen, and he should definitely be commended for his (somewhat fool-hardy) bravery in ignoring the advice of the film's producers in losing the weight.
Strip away Bale's memorising look and a very strong performance and The Machinist is a strange prospect: in a move later extrapolated to unfortunately quite disruptive (and unproductive) results in Transsiberian, Anderson gets dangerously close to obsessive in creating a tone for the film. His commentary track confirms that it is one of the most important things to him in his film-making agenda, and the dream-like tone of The Machinist is definitely testament to that dedication. Occasionally, the director does wander into the self-indulgent when establishing tone (something that unfortunately costTranssiberian some points when I reviewed it on release to DVD, thanks to a lack of relationship development and pace) and seems to care more about establishing an overall eerie feeling than compounding that atmosphere with the detail that would have made for an even more affecting experience.
But when it works, it really works. Bale is luridly watchable- there is something not quite human about him, from the skeletal figure to the skewed mental state, and the atmosphere that is built around him is deliriously claustrophobic throughout. The aesthetic manifesto is equally as impressive, the director draining scenes of colour tone, to accentuate the non-normality of it all (something thankfully that the High Def treatment retains) and increases the richness of colour in certain objects to highlight their importance to a scene.
I won't spoil the ending, but it is pretty simple to work out that Reznik- Christian Bale's insomniac, obsessive character- is losing his mind. The revelation is not the grand reveal of the film, in fact, stylistically, we are being told to accept the fact before his behaviour really becomes too pronounced: the physical abnormality, the behavioral traits, the odd palette of scenes and the eerie, underlying soundtrack all point to it. What we are invited as a voyeuristic audience to enjoy is the process of his insanity- the chaotic unpredictability of what his insanity will compel him to do next. It is a remarkably affecting journey, and it piques the interest until the last scenes.
Quality
It must have been a difficult prospect for the Blu Ray transfer fairies to be faced with such a dark original film requiring lush tonal qualities to remain definable across the transfer, while attempting to add some high definition gloss to such a limited pallet. The temptation to ebb towards a minimally thought-out approach overusing Digital Noise Reduction and edge enhancing must have been massive, and I do suspect it has been going on fairly liberally. There are the obvious ghosts of the processes (electronic halos framing objects and figures most obviously to the nerdier eye), but there arent the usual problems of everyone looking like waxwork exhibits that have been given the added smoothing out of a bountiful round of Botox for their troubles.
The sound is just as ably handled, with the eerie sound accompaniments to the factory scenes given a particularly noticeable extra boost, which in turn adds to the odd atmosphere that the film clearly pitches towards.
Extras
Much better than the original German Blu-Ray release that I managed to get hold of first- and accidentally convinced myself was the new re-release for a while there- with some good, interesting Extras making the whole package an appealing prospect to any aficionado. The highlights are arguably the three featurettes (though the symbolism one isn't that great), with some impressive detail- though you have to wonder why they couldn't go into that great detail when trying to catch the typos that feature a little too prominently in the subtitled sections.
Those features in full:
Audio Commentary- with director Brad Anderson Featurette: The Machinist- Breaking The Rules (25 Mins) Deleted Scenes (12 mins) Theatrical Trailer BR Exclusive Featurette: Manifesting The Machinist (23 mins) BR Exclusive Featurette: The Machinist- Hiding in Plain Sight (14 mins) The Machinist is available now on Blu-ray.