Trevor Reznik (Trent Reznor? John Rzeznik? Gotta be playing off one of 'em...), played by Christian Bale, is a blue-collar factory worker who, for the past year, has been unable to sleep. So he's crazy thin. It's almost shocking, in a Tom-Hanks-in-Cast-Away type way. Where you sometimes get distracted from the actual acting and plot and are just like, "Jesus Christ, how did he drop so many pounds?" I just read that Bale ate 275 calories a day to look like that. My God. He must have felt like shit.
So he can't sleep and accidentally hits some machine-lever which lops his coworker's hand off. So that sucks, and that indirectly ends up getting him fired. But not before he's created a Tyler Durden-y alterego and a fictional relationship with a semi-hot waitress and her son. All throughout, he is constantly having sex with and seeking consultation from the chronically-topless Jennifer Jason Leigh. She has a decent bit part, but isn't really anything special in the grand scheme of the movie.
The brilliance of The Machinist is wrapped up in the score and the cinematography. I could easily see a very similar plot being totally botched with a bad outing by the director. But this was a truly well-rounded effort. Nothing in this movie is really scary, per se, but everything is really creepy. The mood and tone are both rife with suspense. And even though nothing really happens that makes you jump -- and you know nothing will happen that will make you jump -- you're on the edge of your seat anyway.
Although, a dude getting his arm conveyer-belted into a whirring drill is pretty fucking jumpworthy.
