When being asked about his favorite movie, the 'Star Wars' trilogy, Hayden Christensen answered enthusiastically, "A long time ago, in a country not so far away, I was eight years old, doing my best Darth Vader imitation." It is true that as a child who grew up loving the epic saga, this young Canadian actor was keen on impersonating its prominent character. Little he knew that years later he would score the only role he never dare to dream about.

Born on April 19, 1981, this strapping young man is the third of four children to Alie and David Christensen, both worked in communication business owning 'Christensen Communications'. Though born in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, he was brought up and spent most of his formative years in Markham, Ontario. After graduating from Baythorn Public School in 1995, he subsequently attended Unionville High School where he established himself as an accomplished tennis and hockey player. Whereas at the same time, he joined the Art York program, a four year program offered by Unionville High specializing in dance, drama, music and visual arts, concentrating in drama.

Despite his involvement in this program, as any other Canadian teenagers, Christensen was more interested in sports than acting. So to say, his participation in entertainment industry was purely a mere coincidence. Once, he revealed the time when his older sister, Hejsa, a former trampoline champion, was hunting for an agent, "There was no one to baby-sit me and I went along for the ride and they asked me if I wanted to do some commercials and I said sure." Since then, Christensen landed his first acting role on the Canadian television series "Family Passions" as Skip McDeere in 1993. The following years, 1994 to 1999, presented the dirty-blond actor with little room to improve, acquiring only minor roles in several movies, as in "In the Mouth of Madness", the 1995 horror movie directed by John Carpenter and in "The Virgin Suicide" (1999), a drama-mystery movie about the suicides of the five Lisbon sisters in Detroit's upper middle class suburb during the 1970's; while also making small appearances in some television shows.

The year 2000 proved to be this heartthrob's breakthrough point. It was on this year that he got his two most outstanding roles, one of which propelled him to international fame. In early 2000, he starred as Scott Barringer, a 16-year-old athlete abused by his step-mom, in the short lived Canadian television drama series, "Higher Ground," for which he was well-praised by the entertainment critics. Thanks to his conspicuous performance in the TV project that George Lucas, the reputable director of the Star Wars franchise, then chose the then-rather-unknown actor to join the cast of "Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones" (2002), and even more trusted him to depict the most wanted role of Anakin Skywalker, the pivotal character in the original and prequel Star Wars trilogies, creating great buzz in the movie industry and rocketed his name to fame. In between times, Christensen portrayed another well-received character in "Life as a House" (2001), starring alongside his idol Kevin Kline. Playing Sam Monroe, a troubled and misunderstood teenager who helped his sick father to rebuild a house, scored him a 2001 National Board of Review Award for Breakthrough Performance of the Year as well put him in various nominations, naming some were the 2002 Screen Actors Guild Award-Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role and the 2002 Golden Globe Award-Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture. With the release of "Star Wars Episode II" in the year of 2002, this down-to-earth leading man received another worthy praises as well as harsh criticism, mainly for being too soft and whinny on several occasions leading people to think that he just didn't fit to the role of Anakin Skywalker. He was being nominated for many notable awards though, including the 2003 Saturn Award-Best Performance by a Younger Actor, yet walked away with the 2003 Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actor.

Still, getting a Razzie Award did not stop Christensen on landing and successfully depicting illustrious characters. In 2003, he scored another leading character in the based-on-true-story drama movie "Shattered Glass", portraying Stephen Glass, a journalist for 'The New Republic', an opinion-based political magazine, who was caught of making up half of his articles. Once again, he gathered good reviews and award nominations. Following that, he went back to shoot "Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith," the last movie of the Star Wars saga that became the highest grossing movie of 2005 in United States, earning over 850 million US dollars world wide. Later when asked about his role in "Star Wars Episode III," he excitedly said, "I was looking forward to this film because this was the side of Anakin's character that i was really looking forward to playing...that sort of transitional phase of his life where he goes to the dark side." Although the success of the latest episode of Star Wars brought him more awards and nominations, it still could not reprieve Christensen of acquiring his second Worst Supporting Actor Award from the 2006 Razzie Awards considering that many Star Wars fanatics struggled to reason why the skinny actor should be believed as the feared Darth Vader who supposedly is overpowering.

Having done performing his dream role, Christensen continued to film drama-thriller movie "Awake" (2007) and drama movie "Factory Girl" (2006) where he reportedly had a momentary fling with co-star Sienna Miller. Afterwards, he went on playing Lorenzo de Lambreti in "Virgin Territory" (2008). Following that romantic comedy movie, Christensen's next project is to play the part of David Rice, a young man who could teleport himself anywhere, in a science fiction motion picture "Jumper", scheduled to be released on February 14, 2008. Kept adding more film projects into his resume, he also signed on to star in the drama "The Madison Kid" (2009) and war-drama "Beast of Bataan" (2008).

As many other actors and actresses in Hollywood, Christensen prefers to keep his personal life personal. Perhaps that could be the cause he was rumored to be gay, despite the fact that he was most likely to be associated with many of his female co-stars, as Natalie Portman and Rachel Bilson.