"Bad Ass Mofo": Christian Bale

“But I learned that there's a certain character that can be built from embarrassing yourself endlessly. If you can sit happy with embarrassment, there's not much else that can really get to ya.” Christian Bale

This weeks Bad Ass Mofo is Christian Bale. I could just sit here and say the reason is because he is the fucking Batman! After so many failed and goofy versions of the character he was the first to say “Fuck ‘Boomf!’ I’m gonna make this guy scary as shit again!” And he did. Bale is known for his intensity during filming, not breaking his accent until things are finished. He says that it took him forever to drop his Bruce Wayne voice. As cool as he is as an adult he actually started his career young.

In Empire Of The Sun he played this spoiled ass kid who ends up in a concentration camp during World War 2. I didn’t even know this was him at the time when I saw this film. Bale’s actual life reads something like a comic book. His father was a pilot, entrepreneur, and talent manager while his mother was a circus performer. I’m sure this helped shape him to become one of the most consistent BAM’s of all time. He also spent time traveling around the world which probably helped with his ability to sound like he’s not English…uh, British? From over there.

A lot of people have not seen his movie The Machinist because he looked like this. He dropped his weight down to 121lbs. which is ri-goddamn-diculous. He ended up going from this to Batman. No actor has or should attempt to lose as much weight as he did for this creepy ass film. His dedication to parts borders on scary but its always worth it. If he is someone you’ve gotten to star in one of your films you know that if you tell him “Show up with an afro because you’re gonna play a 400 pound Black woman with gingivitis” that he will paint his skin, gain that weight, and drink nothing but Mountain Dew for the next five months to achieve his goal.

There are some movies of his that people don’t talk about much that kicked ass like 3:10 To Yuma, Reign Of Fire, and Equilibrium. In the latter he plays a guy that has mathematically learned that there is a way to break people down and whip their asses. He gained attention for his rant while filming Terminator Salvation. Calling it a rant is an understatement. He went H.A.M on some guy working on set and it got mixed into songs. I’ve even used it in multiple clips of mine it was so intense. Christian Bale is a great choice for starting off the BAM for 2012.