To rebut that proposition, we would like to quietly point to the career of Christian Bale. Since his remarkable breakthrough performance in Steven Spielberg's Empire of The Sun in 1987 at the age of 13, the 35 year old actor has appeared in exactly 35 additional roles of astonishing diversity. From his bloodthirsty portrayal of Patrick Bateman in American Psycho in 2000(in which- among other murderous ploys, he kept a decapitated head in his refrigerator) to the heroic leader of an group of humans beset by marauding dragons in 2002s Reign of Fire, to his revelatory turn as Gulf War Veteran suffering from posttraumatic syndrome in Harsh Times, to his portrayal of an emaciated lathe operator dying of insomnia in The Machinist (for which the actor was rumored to have lost as much as 40 pounds), Bales Career has been an adventure in the unexpected.

 

Of course, Bale is most recently and perhaps better known as Bruce Wayne in the wildly successful Batman Begins and The Dark Knight series (which have together netted a total of $700 million at the box office). As we go to press, he is set to hit the screens as another legendary heroic character, that of John Connor in Terminator Salvation.

 

Bale married Bosnian-American model and makeup artist Sandra "Sibi" Blažić in 2000, with whom he has a daughter Emmeline. Since 1992, he has made Los Angeles his home.

 

Fred Topel for Industry: So, is the buzz cut for Terminator?

Christian Bale: [Laughs] Yeah.

 

Industry: What attracted you to another big franchise film like that?

CB: Well, initially actually that was not an attraction. I felt that I wasn't sure where it could go to. I went back... reviewed the other movies before I gave an answer. I felt like, okay, unlike Batman Begins, this would be something where we would be respecting the previous mythology. Certainly of [Terminator] one and two, not so much number three, but certainly you would be recognizing that mythology, unlike Batman Begins, where we were saying that this is the beginning right here. But what I view in it-and what has ultimately made me make the choice to make it-is that I see the same potential for reinvention and for breathing new life into the mythology. That's what I view our responsibility as filmmakers to be. It's pointless if we don't succeed in doing that.

 

Industry: When you see the script like that for Terminator Salvation or Rescue Dawn and know it's going to be hell, why do you do it?

CB: Because I like going to hell and back. And I knew that Werner [Dengler, a pilot depicted in the film Rescue Dawn; see photo and caption on next page spread] would be a good guy to take us there. How many times in life do you get to do this kind of crazy shit? It's something that I was going to take advantage of. That was the big appeal to me of doing it. Just testing myself and seeing how far I can go.

 

Industry: What do you do in real life for thrills?

CB: Well, even though a finished movie is not real life; when you are actually swimming in the snake infested rivers, you're not acting swimming in snake infested rivers. When you are wrestling with a snake, it's not a pretend snake. You are wrestling with a wild snake. So to me, that is real life...that is what has become my real life. Sure, once it's into the movie, yeah, it's the character. But these are not things that haven't happened to me. I'm not talking about obviously the acting side of it. Being in a POW Camp, etc., of course none of that is real life, but it's always true that in any movie, the physical aspect of it is always real. Unless it's a stunt guy doing it or something, the acting is always fake, but what you physically do, that's real. You're out there.

 

Industry: What won't you do?

CB: Well, look...you put yourself in my position. You're in Thailand, you got these crazy ass Thai chopper pilots who were willing to do anything. They all set up with the stunt guy. "Hold on, what the hell are you doing?" they asked. "Well, a helicopter's going to come in and he's got to stumble out in the rapids. You'll be falling over, going in there. You've got to grab a rope; you've got to hold on whilst they winch you up. You've got to hold onto the railing, because they're going to go off at a clip because they're really low over the trees. You want to be doing that?" I was like, "F&*% yes I want to be doing that! I'm not letting anybody else do that." Now, I've done other things where people have had to be set on fire and jump three stories. I ain't doing that. I've got limits. But I'll tell you, it was fantastic dealing with the Thai air force guys. We would take off and they would take out half a tree with them. These weren't guys who were all about the safety code, you know; they just kind of plowed their way through the jungle. I doubt I'm going to get a chance to do that again, so I'm glad that I did.

 

Industry: Did your agent know you were doing all this crazy stuff?

CB: [Laughs] Oh, I don't tell him. We don't even tell the producers most of the time. They're not on the set, they don't need to know. Insurance certainly doesn't want to know.

 

Industry: Don't you want to sit around and do nothing? Ever temped to take a breather?

CB: Absolutely. Maybe there's a temptation to find a role where preparation involves drinking a lot of wine and eating a lot of pasta and just putting on a lot of weight or something [laughs]. I think I put my body through enough transformation in the past few years that at my age now-getting to mid-30s-I'm starting to think, "Yeah, I might start to have consequences if I keep doing this to myself too much." I'm starting not to quite feel as invulnerable as I always have. But I enjoy the notion of strenuous work. I like it. I like to know I really worked at something. I don't like particularly taking it easy. The thing that I dislike most about filmmaking is waiting...waiting around. You're standing around doing nothing. That's what I dislike.

 

Industry: You said your father is your hero. How so, and is your mother also?

CB: You're getting too personal for me a little bit, but I will give you something. I was just never somebody who really gravitated towards needing a hero. I don't know why; I just never was. Certainly not any kind of comic book style or anything. I had many people whom I found intriguing and interesting, but my father was just always somebody who was very, very engaging and a real character. So the first time I ever considered that question was being asked it in an interview, and I just sat back and thought, "Well, who have I looked up to most consistently throughout my life?" Well, that's my father, of course.

 

Industry: As an actor, how important is it to have a franchise character like Batman. Does it make it financially possible to do things like Rescue Dawn?

CB: Well, I'd be doing things like that movie anyway, because it's not like if I didn't have the franchise, I'd say, "No, I can't make Rescue Dawn." [Director] Werner [Herzog] and I have been talking about making it for a good two-and-a-half years, and I doubt it's a huge coincidence that we got the financing pretty quick after I'd been in Batman [Begins]. So it does mean that I can do these things in a much easier fashion versus a number of years back where, for instance, like American Psycho took two years, just because they didn't want me in it. So, yes, certainly it helps with that, but in and of itself, I really like what [director] Chris [Nolan] has done and working with him on Batman. I tell you, it's the only time in my life when I've been able to actually plan the future, because, usually, you know what you're doing for the next two months if you're lucky. After that, you've got no idea. And I've gone times when I've really needed to work and then there was no work coming in for me; I didn't work for a year and a half or something. I guess having a franchise is the only time you can actually kind of sit back and go "It's alright, you know, it's gonna be okay. Even if nothing else happens, I know that that's going to come along at some point." But you don't even know that, actually, because they could dump me in a second if they want [laughs].

 

Industry: How long does a deeply troubled character like Jim Luther Davis in Harsh Times stay with you?

CB: The intensity as well as the speed of filmmaking meant that I was pretty much Jim the whole time. I remember Dave [director David Ayer] getting very freaked out. We were up in the desert on my last day of filming, and went right through the night...finished at about eight o'clock in the morning. We decided to break open a bottle of tequila and just kind of celebrate. I was suddenly being me again, and he was sitting there and he looked at me and he was going, "Who the f%$# are you? Who is this?" and I could see there was a certain amount of "Well, we've all been played here." We'd become fast friends and that was all completely sincere, but it was all done as Jim. I still consider myself to be a great friend with Dave, but the fact is, he was freaked out at that point, because with that speed of filmmaking, you kind of can't let go of it. But then afterwards he was gone pretty quick, actually. I had other things going on in my life which demanded my attention very quickly, so Jim was gone pretty fast.

 

Industry: It's certainly been a great year for you...

CB: Listen, I've definitely had periods of absolutely nothing going on, and I have made bad choices as well. I've done things which I'm glad I did because I wanted to experiment with certain styles of filmmaking and just see how I worked out. I just stick with what gets its hooks into me, and I figure that as long as you keep that mentality-don't try to be my own kind of marketing man whatsoever-then things will work out. Just as with any writer or any musician, they need to be doing it for themselves, and then, hopefully other people are going to get it as well. So man, it's so nice when people do get it. I'm so happy that The Prestige has done so well, for instance, and I was very pleased with the way that people seem to have gotten Harsh Times, because in no way was this ever a thing where we wanted to bang people over the head with the layers that there are actually within that movie. We had a concern that people would think that it was done for the love of violence...a bunch of teenagers making a movie about some cool guys just causing havoc and getting into a whole lot of trouble and causing mayhem in LA. And it ain't that. It ain't that by a long shot. And it's very nice to at least be hearing from the people who have seen it that they seem to be seeing further into it, which is the reason that I did it.

 

Industry: Did you have any medical assistance in losing such a dramatic amount of weight for your role 
in The Machinist?

CB: I just had a nutritionist whom I visited one time just to inquire about what she thought that I'd probably become deficient in in terms of vitamins and minerals  and everything. So I got those pills. So after that I was
just kind of my own guy about how I felt. I just figured that as long as I was feeling okay, then it must be okay. I would get temperamental at times at the beginning of dieting before I realized that I'd have to just change my entire life and any kind of social life. I would sometimes get very annoyed, because you really felt how much you were missing out; you'd be out seeing friends drinking and eating, and you suddenly realize just how dependent you really are upon that to socialize with everyone.

 

Industry: Was there any worry that you were going to do any damage, such as the liver damage that some actors experienced after a dramatic weight loss?

CB:  I had a stupid kind of feeling of invincibility, like, "Oh you know, I can do it. I can manage it." I certainly did feel that if I was going to do this one time, I could. I would be very cautious about doing it a second time for anything. Also, the novelty is gone. For me, there was also the challenge of whether I was able to do that, to see if it was possible. I managed it better than I had expected. So, I feel like I proved that point to myself...that I could do it. But I didn't actually feel bad until I started eating again; when I started putting the weight back on, I did it somewhat too rapidly, and apparently I had the cholesterol levels of a ninety year old man or whatever. I just had to start getting fit and eating properly. I just gorged too much. I didn't take the advice of everyone, which was take it slow. In putting the weight back on I just wanted to consume pizza and donuts.

 

Industry: How much did you lose?

CB: I don't want to say that. Do you know why? It's because I found that I really respect The Machinist. I like it so much and so many questions were about the weight, that I think it just became the "weight movie," and I think that really did it a disservice. So I don't want to offer numbers any longer, but I lost a lot and then I had to gain a lot again for Batman Begins.

 

Industry: Was all the sacrifice worth it?

CB: I feel that it was, as long as I don't ever find out that there's ever been any permanent damage because of it. I think that it was also just an endeavor where I just wanted to see for myself-beyond the movie itself-I just wanted to see if I could set myself a challenge and achieve it and have the mental discipline not to waiver from it. And it would've been ridiculous if it was all for a movie that I didn't think was worth it. I felt that it was essential for playing this part. And I do think that it's turned out exactly as I hoped it would. 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. To me, a movie doesn't become better just because a lot of people go see it. 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.

 

Industry: After such a strain of mega-studio hits, it's probably fair to say that you've lost your anonymity. Does that make it difficult to be a character actor?

 

CB: I do kind of dream of a day when movies can be made with no interviews necessary whatsoever. That's purely because of that wonderful feeling when you see an actor that you've never seen before in a movie and so you can do nothing but believe in their character. I understand of course that we don't make the movie to just be put away on a shelf and get dusty. We want people to go see it, and I feel a great loyalty to the filmmakers that I'm working with, but generally, the actor becomes the point man when it comes to the publicity of the movie. I'm getting more accustomed to it, but I can't say that I have a lot of trepidation about any potential changes to my life as a result. I'll kick and scream against it if indeed that does change it in any way because that's not a life that I would want to lead at all.