Christian Bale: a reluctant leader’s Exodus

Shot in 3D with striking visual effects, Ridley Scott’s the latest biblical-theme film will be released in Dec 2014

NEW YORK: With massive battle scenes, biblical plagues and a towering tidal wave, British director Ridley Scott’s Exodus: Gods and Kings is an epic historical drama and retelling of the story of Moses as a reluctant prophet.



Shot in 3D with striking visual effects, 20th Century Fox’s Exodus is the latest biblical-theme film to be released in December 2014, dubbed ‘the year of the Bible.’

It follows the success of Paramount Pictures’ Noah, which grossed more than $360 million worldwide, and 20th Century Fox’s Son of God, which took in $68 million worldwide.



Scott’s big-budget epic, which opens in US theatres on Friday, is projected to earn $32 million in its opening weekend.

Oscar-winning actor Christian Bale plays Moses, a former Egyptian prince who rose up against the Pharaoh Ramses and initially was unsure about his role as a prophet.

The 40-year-old actor is renowned for his physical transformation in a variety of roles — from the emaciated insomniac in The Machinist, a sinewy former boxer in The Fighter, which won him an Oscar, to a pudgy con man with a comb-over in American Hustle.

As Moses, Bale delves into the emotional core of the man who led 600,000 slaves out of Egypt.

“He was a man of great passion, a great leader and a liberator, but he was somebody who also had incredible doubts and insecurities,” Bale explained. “I think that makes it so much more fascinating than I had ever realized. And also, in doing that, we are telling it in a new way.”

Scott, 77, who has scored best director Oscar nominations for Gladiator, Black Hawk Down and Thelma & Louise, shot Exodus in Spain, the Canary Islands and Pinewood Studios in England in 74 days, a tight schedule Bale said he found exhilarating.



“For me it feels like I’m most productive, most creative when there is a momentum to the way you shoot. Otherwise, you get lethargic,” Bale said. “And Scott can do that in a way that is more akin to the soul of an independent film, even though this is a vast, big studio film.” 

Published in The Express Tribune, December 15^th,  2014.

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