during filming and directed much of the film while lying on a gurney. The name Trevor Reznik is derived from Trent Reznor, the founder and primary creative force behind the industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails, and the original script had Nine Inch Nails lyrics on the first page. Other Nine Inch Nails tributes include early press articles describing Reznik as experiencing a "downward spiral". However, the strongest literary influence is the Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky. In the DVD commentary, writer Scott Kosar states that he was influenced by Dostoyevsky's novel The Double. The character Reznik is shown reading Dostoyevsky's The Idiot early in the film. When Reznik is riding the "Route 666" attraction, one of the faux marquees reads Crime and Punishment. The number plate Reznik is reading from the red convertible (743 CRN) is the reverse of his Dodge (NRC 347). In Dostoyevsky's The Brothers Karamazov, the character who is visited by a devil is named Ivan. In the 1969 film, Ivan and his devil are played by the same actor (Kirill Lavrov). At the end of the film, as Reznik is sitting in his cell, he's wearing a shirt reading "Justice Brothers". Reception Box office The Machinist opened on 22 October 2004 in three theatres in North America and grossed $1,082,715 with an average of $21,553 per theatre ranking 45th at the box office. The film's widest release was 72 theatres and it grossed $1,082,715 in North America and $7,120,520 in other countries for a total of $8,203,235. Critical response The Machinist has a score of 77% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 143 reviews and an average rating of 6.65/10. The critical consensus states: "Brad Anderson's dark psychological thriller about a sleepless factory worker is elevated by Christian Bale's astonishingly committed performance." On Metacritic the film has a score of 61% based on reviews from 32 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Roger Ebert gave the film three stars out of four and stated in his review for the film: "The director Brad Anderson, working from a screenplay by Scott Kosar, wants to convey a state of mind, and he and Bale do that with disturbing effectiveness. The photography by Xavi Gimenez and Charlie Jiminez is cold slates, blues and grays, the palate of despair. We see Trevor's world so clearly through his eyes that only gradually does it occur to us that every life is seen through