Equilibrium (2002, R)

I really like this movie.  It’s a cool, stylish dystopian film with good heart and great performances, and though its main plot is fairly dystopian-standard, the premise is compelling and well-executed.  I recently watched it again and was reminded how much I enjoy it.

Equilibrium is a bit similar to the Delirium series in that evil government’s goal is to numb the submissive population, but instead of focusing specifically on love, all emotion here is regarded as dangerous subversion.  Every citizen injects themselves daily with a drug that inhibits their emotions, and an elite police force called the clerics is devoted to rooting out the “sense offenders” who secretly forego the drug.  Our protagonist, John Preston, is a dedicated cleric whose entire worldview is scrambled one day thanks to an accidental missed dose, a tiny window of time just long enough to let in the emotions that have been held back from him his entire life.

I previously singled out Preston as one of my top five Christian Bale roles.  His performance here is stunning.  Preston is at first wholly unfeeling – and not just unfeeling, but unable to even comprehend the idea of feeling.  His existence is so paltry and half-lived, but he hasn’t the slightest idea what he’s missing.  Then, when his emotions are accidentally unlocked, it’s remarkable to watch this insensible, highly-controlled man get knocked over by the strength of feelings he’s never experienced.  He has no context for what’s happening, and even as it terrifies him (both for the illegality of sense offense and for the power of his unsuppressed emotions,) he can’t bring himself to go back, because he realizes there’s something so ecstatic about being able to feel.  I especially love his private moments of reacting for the first time to beautiful things.  A big part of the clerics’ job, a la Fahrenheit 451, is finding/destroying sense offenders’ secret hordes of forbidden objects – paintings, music, and poetry, but simpler bric-a-brac as well – and Preston’s first experience hearing Beethoven on a confiscated record is gorgeous.  But of course, Preston is now a sense offender in a field specifically trained to uncover sense offenders, and so Bale’s performance shifts again, this time showing the second, emotional Preston trying to disguise his demeanor and pretend to be the earlier, unfeeling Preston.  Just fantastic all around.

It’s not a perfect movie.  It can be kind of heavy-handed (I mean, of course he winds up in a situation where his fellow clerics are executing a bunch of puppies, pretty much just cuz,) and some of the twists in the last act don’t quite work for me.  However, it’s still a fine film that does some pretty neat things.  I also like the cool-looking “gun kata” combat style used in the movie, and it gets further bonus points for using a Yeats quote that isn’t from “The Second Coming.”  Don’t get me wrong; I like “The Second Coming,” but it’s the one you hear every time pop culture references Yeats, and I love the poem quoted here and how it’s incorporated into the film.  “Be careful, Preston.  You’re treading on my dreams…”

In addition to Bale, the movie features Taye Diggs as a shrewd, ambitious cleric and Emily Watson as a sense offender.  We also get a little from the always-reliable Hey It’s That Guy! William Fichtner, and Sean Bean is terrific in a small role.

Warnings

Violence and thematic elements.

Top Five Roles: Christian Bale

I’ve been side-eying Exodus:  Gods and Kings for using a depressingly-white cast to tell its Egyptian story, and Christian Bale’s remarks on the subject do him no favors.  Still, whatever my thoughts about this movie, the fact remains that he’s an excellent actor who’s brought some fantastic characters to life over his long and varied career.  These are the roles that rise to the top.

Jim Graham (Empire of the Sun)

Obviously, Spielberg had a hand in this – any time someone so young gives such a performance, it’s safe to assume they had a terrific director – but it’s just sublime all the same.  Bale hits every note in this demanding role, a privileged young expat who lands in a Japanese prison camp after the war separates him from his parents.  As sheltered Jim learns to survive his deadly situation, you can’t take your eyes off of him.  27 years later, the P-51 scene is still some of his best work.

Laurie (Little Women)

This was the first film I saw Bale in, although I didn’t know it was him until years later.  I love this engaging, passionate performance as the spirited neighbor of the March girls.  Both he and the film get it just right, that Laurie isn’t a brooding, romantic hero as the girls first imagine him.  Rather, he’s a boy through and through, one with a sly sense of humor, a lust for life, and an ache for companionship.  Even as I see why Jo/Laurie wouldn’t work, I love to watch them together.

Bobby Platt (All the Little Animals)

I’d wager that this odd indie film is mainly known by fans of Bale, John Hurt, or the book it’s based on.  Bobby is a gentle young man with a TBI who runs away from his abusive stepfather.  Along the way, he meets an old loner who, like Bobby, gets along with animals better than people, and Bobby joins his work of putting animals killed by human indifference to rest.  He’s a lovely character, sweet but strong even in his vulnerability, well realized by Bale.

Patrick Bateman (American Psycho)

This one’s obvious, but that doesn’t make it any less necessary.  As the murderous yuppie Patrick Bateman, Bale commits 100% to the insanity within and without his character.  There’s the calm, matter-of-fact way he dispatches some victims and the gleeful relish with which he does in others.  There are his obsessions, his vanity, his materialism, and his absolute bats-in-the-belfry craziness, and his acting in the “Hip to Be Square” scene is one for the ages.

John Preston (Equilibrium)

I really like this sleek, dystopian action piece, and Bale is terrific as a man who’s lived a muted, artificial life but whose eyes have been opened to the full expanse of human emotion.  He’s great as first the emotionless citizen, then the lost man overwhelmed by foreign sensations, and finally the rebel whose feelings bleed through his mask of blankness.  Tons of wonderful moments, but my favorite has to be Preston, his emotions undampened, hearing music for the first time.