In light of Public Enemies release this past week (which I’m hoping to see soon), everybody’s talking about Johnny Depp as Dillinger. Hey I like Johnny as much as the next guy, but it’s Christian Bale whose career often leaves me perplexed at times. I mean he’s obviously a gifted actor from the moment Stephen Spielberg discovered him 22 years ago in Empire of the Sun. And he’s got the chiseled good looks to go with such enormous talent.

Yet his film choices over the years teeter between obscure (Reign of Fire, Capt. Corelli’s Mandolin) and spectacular (3:10 to Yuma, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight). Still it’s fascinating to follow what the folks at Moviefill calls the Bale roller-coaster career.

Source: Tumblr

A few films were omitted which includes a couple of my personal faves: The New World and Equilibrium. They’re on opposite ends of the spectrum as far as story and role goes. On the first, he played a wealthy 17th-century gentleman who fell in love with Pocahontas, and in the latter he’s an elite super-soldier trained to be devoid of emotion in a futuristic world. Yet Bale can play both convincingly. Now if only he’d cave in and do a comedic role one day, ok maybe not a rom-com but a smart comedy (um, something like A Fish Called Wanda perhaps?) Come on Christian, you’ve got it in you!