How good is Heath Ledger in the Dark Knight

Saw the movie a second time today. Heath as the Joker was able to send shivers down my spine at the same moments. I absolutely love that freaky noise he makes when he licks his scars/lips. I imitate it daily, haha.

I have to admit I was very sceptical about all the hype before watching the Dark Knight. But having seen it, I have to say it was pretty awesome.
Like many have said, it wasn't Heath Ledger up there on screen, but The Joker!
Many have said they were worried that Ledger may not have the character to carry off the role, that he wasn't big enough to make it his own.
But I think the fact that he wasn't a big name or a 'superstar' helped him. There comes a point in an actor career when they become bigger than the roles they play. Lets be honest, as great as they are, when you see De Niro or Pacino on screen these days, that's exactly what you do see. De Niro or Pacino, it becomes tougher to see around their own personality and see the character. Maybe Jack's Joker was affected by this.

Very few can carry it off, Hopkins & Day Lewis perhaps. Mainly because they make very few films and you hardly ever see or hear them off screen.
And I think that why Ledger's Joker is so effective. Off screen Ledger was an enigma, somewhat reclusive. He hated the glitz and glamour of Hollywood and we as movie goers never really had a glimpse of what made him tick. So when we see him as The Joker, we see The Joker. Not film star Heath Ledger.

if I didn't know beforehand that it was Heath Ledger I was watching, I never would have guessed. I love this new Batman series with Bale

Pj_Gurl wrote:

Or maybe, just maybe, he was THAT good sponger. I can't prove that drugs didn't improve his performance and you can't prove they did. At the end of the day, it was a remarkable performance, ledger was a brilliant joker, and i prefer to believe that his performance was that awesome because he worked so damn hard at it. I also believe in Christoper Nolan....

In the words of Christopher Nolan,

Heath Ledger finished filming this summer’s Batman sequel, The Dark Knight, in which he plays a villain, the Joker. Christopher Nolan, the film’s director, recalls Heath’s charisma and shared these beautiful memories in the latest issue of Newsweek:

“One night, as I’m standing on LaSalle Street in Chicago, trying to line up a shot for The Dark Knight, a production assistant skateboards into my line of sight. Silently, I curse the moment that Heath first skated onto our set in full character makeup. I’d fretted about the reaction of Batman fans to a skateboarding Joker, but the actual result was a proliferation of skateboards among the younger crew members. If you’d asked those kids why they had chosen to bring their boards to work, they would have answered honestly that they didn’t know. That’s real charisma—as invisible and natural as gravity. That’s what Heath had.

Heath was bursting with creativity. It was in his every gesture. He once told me that he liked to wait between jobs until he was creatively hungry. Until he needed it again. He brought that attitude to our set every day. There aren’t many actors who can make you feel ashamed of how often you complain about doing the best job in the world. Heath was one of them.

One time he and another actor were shooting a complex scene. We had two days to shoot it, and at the end of the first day, they’d really found something and Heath was worried that he might not have it if we stopped. He wanted to carry on and finish. It’s tough to ask the crew to work late when we all know there’s plenty of time to finish the next day. But everyone seemed to understand that Heath had something special and that we had to capture it before it disappeared. Months later, I learned that as Heath left the set that night, he quietly thanked each crew member for working late. Quietly. Not trying to make a point, just grateful for the chance to create that they’d given him.

Those nights on the streets of Chicago were filled with stunts. These can be boring times for an actor, but Heath was fascinated, eagerly accepting our invitation to ride in the camera car as we chased vehicles through movie traffic—not just for the thrill ride, but to be a part of it. Of everything. He’d brought his laptop along in the car, and we had a high-speed screening of two of his works-in-progress: short films he’d made that were exciting and haunting. Their exuberance made me feel jaded and leaden. I’ve never felt as old as I did watching Heath explore his talents. That night I made him an offer—knowing he wouldn’t take me up on it—that he should feel free to come by the set when he had a night off so he could see what we were up to.

When you get into the edit suite after shooting a movie, you feel a responsibility to an actor who has trusted you, and Heath gave us everything. As we started my cut, I would wonder about each take we chose, each trim we made. I would visualize the screening where we’d have to show him the finished film—sitting three or four rows behind him, watching the movements of his head for clues to what he was thinking about what we’d done with all that he’d given us. Now that screening will never be real. I see him every day in my edit suite. I study his face, his voice. And I miss him terribly.

Back on LaSalle Street, I turn to my assistant director and I tell him to clear the skateboarding kid out of my line of sight when I realize—it’s Heath, woolly hat pulled low over his eyes, here on his night off to take me up on my offer. I can’t help but smile.”

and this from michael caine:

"lovely guy, i got to know him a little bit. just on the set a bit. i was so impressed by his performance. and when i saw the movie, i was bowled over. on set we would be chatting about this or that. then the director would say, 'were ready heath' and then he'd go straight into that maniacal thing. i told him, 'im too hold to play a part like that. i dont have the energy to do that, what you do. come to think of it i dont think i had the energy to do it at your age.' it was stunning on the screen. but to be there when he was doing it..." he lets out a long, slow profanity.

I think a lot of the hype unfortuneately was because he died after. Sorry, but the world LOVES sensationalizing.

he was scary; very scary. And I won't spoil it but at the end he was funny too. (anyone who saw it, am I right?) So, yeah it was a great performance.

intodeep wrote:

No. not at all. no where near it. Would never come into the conversation of best in performance in history.


His performace was very good though and he really nailed it.

Edit- also i would add Christian Bale plays Batman/Bruce Wayne perfectly. He plays his charctor probably just as good as Ledger plays the Joker but Bale is not getting any of the love from critics about his job.

No, but I LOVE CHRISTIAN BALE!!

After seeing the whole sexy batman/Bruce Wayne thing, I am a big fan of him as batman again. But I must say that I liked Katy Holmes better as the chick in the movie.

writersu wrote:

I think a lot of the hype unfortuneately was because he died after. Sorry, but the world LOVES sensationalizing.

he was scary; very scary. And I won't spoil it but at the end he was funny too. (anyone who saw it, am I right?) So, yeah it was a great performance.

This is such BULLSHIT, and I get pissed every time I hear someone say this. The trailer came out BEFORE he died, and it was getting all kinds of rave reviews and amped anticipation. Sure his death added to the mystique, but his performance more than exceeds any and all expectations, REGARDLESS of his death. To attribute any praise or awards he has or may receive to his untimely death is not only disrespectful but an insult to Heath and all of us who have been looking forward to this movie since before his death and who enjoy it for what it is.

AllNiteThing wrote:

This is such BULLSHIT, and I get pissed every time I hear someone say this. The trailer came out BEFORE he died, and it was getting all kinds of rave reviews and amped anticipation. Sure his death added to the mystique, but his performance more than exceeds any and all expectations, REGARDLESS of his death. To attribute any praise or awards he has or may receive to his untimely death is not only disrespectful but an insult to Heath and all of us who have been looking forward to this movie since before his death and who enjoy it for what it is.

I am sorry, I wasn't trying to be disrespectful in the least. I was merely alluding to the whole People Magazine thing about his "other" child and all the crap that is printed after someone dies. I did say that I thought that he was very good and very scary.

And I am sorry but no I didn't get to hear a lot until after he died. But that is not to say he was not still great.

I just meant that like princess Di for example. People made her a saint after she died; it was weird. All of the sudden she was all over the place. That, to me, disrespects someone because it takes their actual life and makes it seem nothing compared to their death.

I thought he was brilliant. It seemed like most of the lines they used in the trailers were lines where he sounded kind of like Jack Nicholson's Joker, but in the rest of the movie he was much creepier.

There's a little something about the way he hesitates as he starts to say something, and that hint of condescension in his tone, that reminds me of...

John McCain!

I didn't realize it during the movie, but now whenever I hear McCain quoted on NPR, all I can picture is the Joker about to hurt someone. I've always thought McCain was a loose cannon, and now it's cemented in my mind.

Melissa

Wanna see a pencil disappear???


Great performance.....