When the 2012 movie year finally closes, one of the most insistent trends that will be associated with it will be the way that radical body transformation and reinvention hit the mainstream of the screen acting world. The list of actors who lost weight, gained weight or seriously bulked up for a role in a 2012 movie or did the work in 2012 for a movie to be released in 2013 stretches from Anne Hathaway to Shia LaBeouf. In the case of Hathaway, the result was a drastic weight loss over a very short period of time that might well have taken the title of most extreme case of body reinvention had it not been for a late season surge run by ridiculously ripped Matthew Fox.
“Alex Cross” is scheduled to open in theaters and were it not for Fox, the biggest shock to longtime fans of the titular character might be just how different he looks from past cinematic incarnations. The explanation for the shocking change in physical appearance of the Cross character is easily explained: Tyler Perry has replaced Morgan Freeman. As immediately evident as the change that has taken place in the physical appearance of Alex Cross may be, that transformation may actually pale in comparison to the extraordinary development in the physique of Matthew Fox. And, yes, that sentence is supposed to be taken quite literal.
It isn’t just the bald head that Fox sports as a killer who moonlights as a vicious cage fighter that present a shocking counterpoint to the image of the actor that most people have upon hearing his name. If you only know Fox from his roles on TV shows like “Party of Five” or “Lost” then you may well spend the entire movie trying to figure out which character Matthew Fox plays. That’s because the guy playing Picasso in “Alex Cross” is ripped with long, sinewy muscles slithering down from his neck to his biceps and so bears almost no resemblance at all to the Fox that came before. Images of Matthew Fox in the cage in which his character fights presents an image of a man who appears to have shed every last ounce of fat on his body.
If Anne Hathaway is the poster image of the Class of 2012 when it comes to actors who lost weight in order to look as positively unhealthy as their character is supposed to be without actually getting sick themselves, then Matthew Fox has become the poster image of the actor who drops all the excess fatty tissue and replaces it a molded body of steel that actually manages to look more intimidating than the molded muscles on the Batman costume that has enhanced the image of Christian Bale as a foe worthy of battle in Christopher Nolan’s trilogy of one Dark Knight.
For more from Timothy Sexton, check out:
Was Anne Hathaway Reckless for Revealing Details of Drastic Diet?
Tom Hardy as Bane: Physical Transformation as Psychopathology
