Twenty Most Unbelievable Transformations
AMC Movie List

Twenty Most Unbelievable Transformations

Impressed by a skinny star who gets fat? Or a man dressed as a woman? Who isn't? Which of these twenty transformations is most shocking?

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1 Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight (2008)

This Joker manages to make people forget all about Nicholson (and Romero) by bringing an even scarier smirk to the Batman franchise.

424 590
2 Christian Bale in The Machinist (2003)

Bale was intense even before becoming Batman. He starved himself for four months to play a chronic insomniac.

189 455
3 Robert Downey, Jr. in Tropic Thunder (2008)

Downey earned an Oscar nod for playing an Australian actor playing an African-American G.I. in a Vietnam War movie.

180 526
4 Robin Williams in Mrs. Doubtfire (1993)

Pretending to be an old British woman is a small price to pay for a devoted dad hoping to spend some time with his kids.

136 470
5 Jack Nicholson in Batman (1989)

In Tim Burton's Batman, Nicholson made people forget Cesar Romero's campy Joker by dancing around to Prince in a pimp suit.

133 497
6 Edward Norton in American History X (1998)

Norton went from buff tattooed Neo-Nazi to slightly less buff, tattooed ex-Neo-Nazi trying to make amends.

131 419
7 Tom Hanks in Castaway (2000)

From Fedex exec to rugged, ragged survivalist, Hanks maintains his sanity during his change with the help of a friend: Wilson the volleyball.

128 444
8 John Hurt in The Elephant Man (1980)

As a man with a head so large he could've been a modern news anchor, Hurt famously tells the world, "I am not an animal!"

83 359
9 Brad Pitt in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008)
The old man in diapers who became the old baby in diapers is a preview of what Hollywood's most beautiful man will look like years from now.
76 434
10 Jim Carey in How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000)

In real life, he stole Jenny McCarthy's heart. In this movie, he become the titular green grouch and takes Christmas away from Whoville.

73 443
11 Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie (1982)

The method actor tricks everyone into believing he's a soap star, even though he looks like a menopausal hobbit.

65 383
12 Jeff Goldblum in The Fly (1986)

The upside to becoming The Fly? He could have sex for hours on end. The downside? He had to regularly eat his own vomit!

59 359
13 Billy Crystal in The Princess Bride (1987)

Is that you under there Billy? As the healer Miracle Max, Crystal dons so much makeup he's indistinguishable from his hideous wife. 

51 379
14 Eddie Murphy in The Nutty Professor (1996)

Murphy liked donning a fat suit so much in The Nutty Professor that he went back and did it again a decade later in Norbit (2007).

29 401
15 John Travolta in Hairspray (2007)

In Grease he sings and dances. In Hairspray, he does all that and dresses up as an obese agoraphobic woman. What's next?

-29 401
16 Jack Lemmon in Some Like It Hot (1959)

Before he was a Grumpy Old Man, Lemmon was an ugly woman on the run, putting on his skirt one leg at a time.

-40 324
17 Jaye Davidson in The Crying Game (1992)

Davidson's female gender-bender is so fetching, the hero eventually gets over the realization that she is a he!

-92 314
18 Jared Leto in Chapter 27 (2006)

Leto did what he had to do to play John Lennon's portly assassin. Namely, gaining almost 70 lbs by drinking microwaved ice cream.

-101 315
19 Mike Myers in The Cat in the Hat (2003)

Unlike the Grinch, another beloved Seuss character, this rhyming cat in the hat will never, ever be back.

-125 359
20 John Travolta in Battlefield Earth (2000)

It's hard to believe that the star of Pulp Fiction would get so lost in space, but this Scientology-tinged turkey nearly spun him out of orbit.

-213 371
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