Actor Christian Bale (WireImage)
Actor Christian Bale (WireImage)
A meeting between Chen Guangcheng and Christian Bale appears likely now the Chinese dissident has settled with his family in the US — five months after the Hollywood star was roughed up by guards when he tried to visit Chen under house arrest in his native country.
Bale was in China in December 2011, promoting his film “The Flowers of War,” when guards blocked him from visiting Chen, throwing punches and chasing the actor and a CNN film crew from the area in their van.
Chen was under house arrest after revealing forced sterilizations and late-term abortions affecting thousands of women in the eastern province of Shandong as part of measures to enforce China’s population control policy.
Bale had described the blind activist as a personal “inspiration,” AFP reported at the time, and invited the film crew to accompany him on an eight-hour drive from Beijing to Chen’s home in a Linyi district village.
Now, after arriving at the weekend with his wife and children in New York, where he will study at NYU and continue his activism, Chen has said he wants to meet Bale.
In turn, the English star of “The Fighter,” “The Dark Knight” and “Terminator Salvation” told CNN, “Please shake Chen’s hand, and give him and his family a hug from me upon their arrival in the US.
“They must be overwhelmed with relief at being … safe. I would love to meet with Chen when he has the time.”
During his attempt to visit Chen last December, Bale demanded of the guards, “Why can I not visit this free man?” The guards, meanwhile, tried to snatch a camera and drag him away.
“I’m not being brave doing this,” Bale reflected in the van, once he and the film crew had made their getaway. “The local people who are standing up to the authorities, who are visiting Chen and his family and getting beaten up for it … I want to support what they’re doing.”
Bale said he had been moved by Chen’s story while in China filming “The Flowers of War,” which is about the Nanjing Massacre, when Japanese troops killed tens of thousands of Chinese civilians during 1937-38.