Christian Bale is known for pushing his body to the limits for the sake of doing his characters justice. But in a film where Bale might have pushed himself a bit too far, his wife had a difficult time watching his drastic transformation.
Christian Bale’s extreme weight loss for ‘The Machinist’ concerned his wife
Audiences saw what Bale was willing to do to inhabit a role in his 2004 film The Machinist. The movie saw The Dark knight star playing a factory worker grappling extreme insomnia. To properly portray the physically and mentally disturbed character, Bale slimmed down to 121 pounds. To achieve this feat, Bale once told Radio Free he put himself on a diet where he ate practically nothing.
“My daily thing was generally like a bit of a coffee and an apple if I felt like it. Well, I had to eat the pie in the scene, and then there was a scene eating chicken as well,” he said. “But I tried not to swallow. Because it’s amazing how you can literally just have a couple of bites of something and your face will expand again if you’re really at that low point.”
Many were concerned about Bale’s methods, however, with some insisting the actor to visit a doctor during this intense period. But perhaps the one who displayed the most concern about Bale’s well-being was his wife Sibi Blazic, who had to watch Bale waste away up close. But Bale assured his partner that if he ever truly put his health at risk, he’d abandon the project.
“It was tough. Although my wife was with me the whole way, so it was a gradual decline, it wasn’t very pleasant for her to be around and witness. She did get pretty worried, and I promised her that if I ever felt something bad might happen, I’d just quit,” he once said according to Female First.
Why Christian Bale didn’t use CGI to achieve his look in ‘The Machinist’
Bale initially didn’t set out to lose all the weight that he did for The Machinist. The actor confided that he did what he felt was necessary for the character, but soon found himself going overboard.
“He read to me as though he should look as though he was on the brink of death. And I didn’t set out to actually go as skinny as I did,” he explained. “I just found that I was being somewhat more successful at it than I had imagined. And I actually ended up being able to get to the weight that was specified in the script, which I never really thought was going to be possible at all.”
Others suggested Bale could’ve used CGI to achieve the desired appearance. But Bale didn’t trust the technology at the time to offer audiences a reliable image of his character. Aside from that, the Oscar-winner’s extreme weight loss actually came with a few benefits.
“It ended up being a very nice place mentally to be when you get that skinny. Man, you’re calm, you know? Because you just can’t waste any energy whatsoever. So you just do what’s necessary. I was incredibly happy,” he said.
Christian Bale thought losing weight for ‘The Machinist’ was worth it
The Machinist wasn’t the most popular film back when it first hit theaters. But despite it not being as popular as Bale’s other films, Bale didn’t regret going the distance for his role. Instead, he believed losing all of that weight was worth it.
“I understand that a number of people have also said to me, ‘Well, this isn’t going to be a mainstream movie. You’re not going to get many people to go and see it. So why did you do it?’ Well, look, it’s not for that,” Bale once told MovieWeb. “To me a movie doesn’t become better just because a lot of people go see it at all. My primary satisfaction for making movies is actually in the making of the movie. So in those terms, absolutely, I feel like it was worth it.”
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