Yesterday, the late Heath Ledger was nominated for an Oscar for his role as The Joker in The Dark Knight (on the exact one-year anniversary of his death...how creepy is that?).
Now, I admit, there's no way for me to be fair about this--not only have I not seen the other nominated performances (Josh Brolin, Milk, Robert Downey Jr., Tropic Thunder, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Doubt, Michael Shannon, Revolutionary Road) but I was simply astounded at the level of commitment Ledger brought to the part of the Joker.
The charming, approachable leading man that was Heath Ledger was completely gone in The Dark Knight--instead we got a genuinely chilling portrait of Chaos Personified. I'm not sure how much of this was in the script, but whatever the percentages, it was an amazing synthesis of conception and execution in bringing the character to life.
When I saw the film in the theater, there's a scene where The Joker basically walks in to a meeting of mobsters, and performs an act of murderous cruelty while also delivering a joke.
Its a truly surprising scene, and what was even more surprising was the audience's reaction--applause.
Yes, applause--and I think that's because the people in the audience (for the first midnight showing) were die-hard Batman and/or comic fans, and in that one moment, we all knew that the people who made this film completely got the Joker character--what makes him frightening yet totally compelling.
He wasn't the murderous yet still kinda goofy clown we saw in the 1989 Batman--no, this was a grenade thrown into the movie at occasional intervals, busting the movie wide open and creating chaos, despite the best efforts of the stalwart Batman (once again well played by Christian Bale).
I can't imagine Ledger won't win this, based on just the sympathy factor alone. But even without that, he deserves it.
Now, I admit, there's no way for me to be fair about this--not only have I not seen the other nominated performances (Josh Brolin, Milk, Robert Downey Jr., Tropic Thunder, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Doubt, Michael Shannon, Revolutionary Road) but I was simply astounded at the level of commitment Ledger brought to the part of the Joker.
The charming, approachable leading man that was Heath Ledger was completely gone in The Dark Knight--instead we got a genuinely chilling portrait of Chaos Personified. I'm not sure how much of this was in the script, but whatever the percentages, it was an amazing synthesis of conception and execution in bringing the character to life.
When I saw the film in the theater, there's a scene where The Joker basically walks in to a meeting of mobsters, and performs an act of murderous cruelty while also delivering a joke.
Its a truly surprising scene, and what was even more surprising was the audience's reaction--applause.
Yes, applause--and I think that's because the people in the audience (for the first midnight showing) were die-hard Batman and/or comic fans, and in that one moment, we all knew that the people who made this film completely got the Joker character--what makes him frightening yet totally compelling.
He wasn't the murderous yet still kinda goofy clown we saw in the 1989 Batman--no, this was a grenade thrown into the movie at occasional intervals, busting the movie wide open and creating chaos, despite the best efforts of the stalwart Batman (once again well played by Christian Bale).
I can't imagine Ledger won't win this, based on just the sympathy factor alone. But even without that, he deserves it.
0 comments:
Post a Comment