Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #8912 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-08-01
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 98 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
As a bleak and chilling mood piece, The Machinist gets under your skin and stays there. Christian Bale threw himself into the title role with such devotion that he shed an alarming 63 pounds to play Trevor Reznik (talk about "starving artist"!), a factory worker who hasn't slept in a year. He's haunted by some mysterious occurrence that turned him into a paranoid husk, sleepwalking a fine line between harsh reality and nightmare fantasy--a state of mind that leaves him looking disturbingly gaunt and skeletal in appearance. (It's no exaggeration to say that Bale resembles a Holocaust survivor from vintage Nazi-camp liberation newsreels.) In a cinematic territory far removed from his 1998 romantic comedy Next Stop Wonderland, director Brad Anderson orchestrates a grimy, nocturnal world of washed-out blues and grays, as Trevor struggles to assemble the clues of his psychological conundrum. With a friendly hooker (Jennifer Jason Leigh) and airport waitress (Aitana Sánchez-Gijón) as his only stable links to sanity, Trevor reaches critical mass and seems ready to implode just as The Machinist reveals its secrets. For those who don't mind a trip to hell with a theremin-laced soundtrack, The Machinist seems primed for long-term status as a cult thriller on the edge. --Jeff Shannon, Amazon.com

Synopsis
Christian Bale delivers one of cinema's most sacrificial performances in Brad Anderson's mesmerising 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 colourless 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.

Customer Reviews

"A little guilt goes a long way"
"A little guilt goes a long way." So says Trevor Reznik to the waitress in the airport café at midnight.

Christian Bale, who lost 63Ibs to play the part, is Trevor Reznik, the machinist in the title. He's the worker who cannot sleep, whose life is a daze, the man slowly tortured by his own living dream. Why is he so emaciated? Why cannot he sleep? Why is he plagued by sinister tricks of the mind? So many questions; what are the answers? I'm not going to spoil it by giving them here, but suffice to say that his colleague Ivan is not all that he seems. (Bale appears in every scene and his commitment to the film is clear. How he failed to be nominated for his role is beyond me.)

The movie opens at its ending (so keep your eyes well-peeled). A languid pace is prevalent from the start. In his commentary, director Brad Anderson admits to Hitchcock being a direct influence in the making of this clever film - "the last Hitchcock movie never made". The colours are often dark, almost black/white in places with many of the colours leached out; much of it was shot at night. Sinister and curious tropes appear, such as the game of hangman, photographs from a past that was not lived, memory problems, paranoia, nosy old landladies, and cars coloured red. Just what is real and what is not? (The very useful director's commentary will point out clues that you may have missed.)

The Hitchcockian feel extends to the score, written by a Spanish composer but in the style of Bernard Herrmann. There are repetitive harp figurations and deep long breathing in the strings; even the sound of the theremin is resurrected. Anderson says that the film is "a parable about guilt". It's not a horror movie; rather it is a dark drama a la Kafka. Indeed, the screenwriter was inspired by Kafka and Dostoyevsky, and there are references to the latter in the film: Reznik is reading "Crime and Punishment" (nudge, nudge: clue!).

Because Brad Anderson had difficulties raising money in the States for his movie, it was shot in Barcelona and Andorra. But you'd never guess! This was such a surprise to me when it was explained by the director in his commentary. This explains the presence of the Spanish composer, the Spanish DoP, the French production designer, and so on. The team has performed marvels in translating the production into a convincing American milieu from a European base.

As well as the director's commentary, the extras also include a 25-minute interview with Brad Anderson, a 25-minute "making of" (with interviews with the actors and some of the production team), and some deleted scenes.

I enjoyed it - my mates didn't.
have to agree that the concept of the machinist after films like fight club and mememto is not original anymore - but what does make this film worth wathcing is that it is not glamorised like fight club - the life that the lead character Resnik leads is not a happy one or a pretty one to view.

it really does give you a glimpse of the anguish and panic of realising you are actually 'mad' I actually felt sorry for him when he finally realises all is not as it seems - now when you see 'mad' people shouting at random people (or nothing) in the street you might think twice about the frustrations and torment they go through to make them act like that before telling them where to go!!!

a couple of reviewers mentioned it was so 'obvious' what was real and what wasnt - but the film wasnt trying to hide that - it was more about his life and the way it built itself up then demolished itself.

my girlfriend didnt like it coz it was too dark for her and my mate didnt like it coz well.. he doesnt like anything....

comparisons to fight club are inevitable - insomnia - hallucinations - 'double life' - but as this doesnt have the attractive male lead, cool image and persona - it will be seen as an inferior film by many.

I found Fight club over stylised - more style than substance - take away the outgoing Pitt and its just boring Norton and a heroin addict.

Out of the 2 films i found the machinist much more profound and powerful as a movie, but that might not suit some people!

Take a stroll down memory muddy path
Too often actors wax lyrical about how much they've thrown themselves into a part and how well they know the character. Christian Bale seriously raised the bar in The Machinist. The amount of weight he lost for this role is so astounding that you can't help but wonder if the extra shots of him stretching and checking himself in the mirror were just a case of the director not believing it either and needing to catch every bone and tendon on celluloid as proof.
This whole movie is expertly carried by those bony shoulders with some great support from Jennifer Jason Leigh and Bale does a masterful job. He manages to portray a strung-out and haunted character whose favoured companion is a prostitute yet still attracts our empathy.
Bale and director Brad Anderson take our hand and lead us through the tunnels of the main character Reznik's doubt, fear and deteriorating sanity in such a way that it feels a mental vice is slowly being turned until something must give. When we discover Reznik's past we are exposed to a sense of loss and despair rather than a demand for retribution which indicates how subtlety we are drawn into Reznik's psyche.