The Dark Knight In Heath We Trust: A Ledgerbration: The TDK Joker Appreciation Thread

[C. Lee]

Attention people.....do not post the link to the youtube video about Joker dying of drug overdose....the language used in it is not allowed on here.

 

[crimsonrain650]

not sure if ppl know this already, but there is a book out now about Heath Ledger. I bought it and have almost finished reading it and its really good. Theres a section that talks about him in TDK but i havent read it yet.

 

[Darkness Falls]

ok so i got bored so i watched a dark knight clip
joker crashes the party
very funny joker grabbing food and drinks lol

but towards the end he

Spoiler

talks to some old guy saying ''you remind me of my father, i hated my father''

if i remember correctly joker has brought up his father issues in the comics

if heath doesn't win a oscar for his preformance i will be disappointed as he gave his psychotic joker an edge that no one else would be able to achieve
and the live action joker i have beeen waiting to see for a long time

 

[aggrosign]

I'm all for heath's performance as the joker and I think its absolutely phenonominal, but whos to say really that someone else out there cant play him just as well if not better? I remember when he was first cast a lot of ppl hated him and thought he couldnt do it and he was poor choice and now your eating your words. It is not impossible that someone can play him just as well or even better, chances are slim but impossible..and theres wild rumours going around that if there is a third joker will be recasted so meh. Ive rambled on long enough.

 

[Etienne]

I didn't know where else to post this and I did not want to make a new thread for fear of it being closed. This is a great little article about Heath.

http://www.film.com/movies/story/remembering-heath-ledger-eve-his/21829880
Remembering Heath Ledger on the Eve of His Greatest Performance

Jul 15, 2008, Cole Haddon

The first time I saw him on the big screen was in Two Hands back in 1999 (just before the release of 10 Things I Hate About You in the States). I was in Sydney, Australia at the time, his native country, and it was hard to deny the wattage this kid we came to know as Heath Ledger exuded even then.

The first time I saw him in person was January of 2004, again in Sydney. My girlfriend and I were checking out Cold Mountain shortly after its release and, before the movie started, I noticed a murmur spreading amongst the audience, around me where I sat in the second row. I assumed somebody of some notoriety was in the theater with us, but paid it no mind and, a few minutes later, got up to use the restroom. In this restroom was a poster for Ledger’s latest movie, The Order, but I thought nothing of it (nobody did; the movie was terrible). On the way back to my seat, I passed by the front row where my eyes wandered to a pair of very sexy legs propped up on the half-wall there; they, I quickly realized, belonged to none other than Naomi Watts. Let me say this: the woman is beyond beautiful. This is what makes it all the more astonishing that I don’t remember Watts so much that day in Sydney. I remember her then-boyfriend Ledger, who was sitting next to her, a hipster’s fisherman-style cap pulled low over his brow. In person, Ledger had even more wattage than he did on screen. I couldn’t look away. For the rest of Cold Mountain, I didn’t watch Nicole Kidman on screen or Watts one row in front of me. I watched Heath Ledger shift nervously, simper, and grin boyishly, and it was glorious.

Over the next several years, I had a couple other run-ins with the actor. Twice more I sat behind him in auditoriums where his social anxiety was always evident. He was not terribly comfortable in public places, as near as I could tell, or at least not with being Heath Ledger The Actor in public places. Behind closed doors, perhaps he handled his celebrity better.

Later, I was supposed to interview Ledger for his eventually Oscar-nominated performance in Brokeback Mountain, but got Jake Gyllenhaal instead. On a couple of occasions, I also got to listen to acquaintance Ben Harper, a good friend of Ledger’s, sing Ledger’s praises as a human being. Harper loved Ledger so much that he wrote “Happy Ever After in Your Eyes” from his album Both Sides of the Gun as a lullaby for Ledger’s daughter, Matilda (I wonder if Harper can still perform the song after what’s happened).

Every almost-encounter I had with Ledger made me want to meet him even more. But it never happened.

That’s because on January 22nd this year, Ledger died of an accidental overdose. He was only 28 years old.

This week, he stars as the Joker in The Dark Knight -– a movie that what will be considered by most to be his final role and perhaps his finest performance (even though he’ll appear briefly in next year’s The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus). More than just “stars as the Joker,” Ledger is the one-and-only star of The Dark Knight, not Christian Bale. You can’t look away from the guy when he’s in front of you, just like that day in a Sydney theater in 2004. Instead of mourn him a minute longer, buy a ticket to The Dark Knight and celebrate his talent and, more importantly, his life and accomplishments. By grace, by happenstance, or by dedication to his craft, he deserves cinema’s eternal affection.

 

[branwen]

Oh, child......

 

[terry78]

Oscar watchers dampen award hype for Ledger's Joker
Wednesday July 16 3:59 PM ET

When the new Batman movie "The Dark Night" began screenings last month before its U.S. debut on Friday, some moviegoers saw Heath Ledger as an instant Oscar candidate as the deranged villain, The Joker.

But Oscar watchers and veteran critics say the joke may be on fans creating mostly Internet-based buzz because an Academy Award for the Australian actor, who died of an accidental drug overdose in January, would be a rare event.

Only one actor has won an Oscar after death, Peter Finch for 1976's "Network."

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"Dark Knight" is the type of comic book, action adventure that Oscar voters generally do not favor and there are many movies to see later this year, the experts said.

Still, Ledger's critically hailed performance may bring a nomination for the U.S. film industry's top award, to be presented next on February 22, 2009.

"All this Oscar talk is a phenomenon of the Internet age that I like to call 'a wish-fulfillment rumor.' If people say it often enough, they think it will happen," said Leonard Maltin, film critic for TV program "Entertainment Tonight."

"That's not to say it might not happen," he said, citing a "great performance" by Ledger. "But I assure you that the people who are spreading all this are neither Oscar voters nor (Hollywood) movers and shakers."

Tom O'Neil, a columnist for award-watching Web site The Envelope.com, said "it really looks good" for a nomination but was "a long shot" to win.

Hollywood has a long history of seeing big stars -- James Dean, Marilyn Monroe and Bruce Lee among them -- appearing in high-profile films released after their untimely deaths.

O'Neil said that when Finch died, Hollywood was in the middle of Oscar season and also in shock. Prior to that, Robert De Niro was sweeping the critics' awards for "Taxi Driver."

Veteran Oscar watcher O'Neil also sees parallels between the truncated careers of Ledger and James Dean.

"Like Heath, James Dean was a heartthrob star who was considered a serious actor, who died tragically young," O'Neil said. "He was nominated twice posthumously, for "East of Eden" and "Giant," and he lost both times."

Even the legendary Spencer Tracy was ignored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which gives out the Oscars, after he died in 1967 just as "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?" was coming. And he was the front-runner, O'Neil said.

Tracy's co-star Katharine Hepburn did win best actress for "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?"

"That's how reluctant Oscar voters are to hug the dead," O'Neil said. "These awards are all about hugs and there's something creepy about embracing the dead."

 

[ronny]

Ledger will not win an Oscar. The monkeys in charge over there are even more elitist and narrow minded than Jett and that's realy saying something y'all.
Didn't give Taxi Driver any awards, didn't give Pacino the best actor award for Scarface and only showered the Lord of The Rings with praise once the final film rolled around.
They're meant to pick the best movies but at the end of the day they're nothing but backstabbing, second rate politicians.
So, even if Ledger deserves it (I wouldn't know, I've not seen it yet) it will never happen. Bunch of old fossils wouldn't know a good movie if it bit them in their wrinkled, leaking arses.

 

[chamber-music]

 

[DarkReflections]

i remember finding this song on youtube a couple days after heath died:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gw4DXrgtBAQ

this is a great tribute to heath and i think its unbelievable.

 

[sv2]

Hey wasn't there supposed to be a video tribute to Heath after the credits? I thought there was :S

 

[Dark Donnie]

I thought there was a In Memory of for Heath and the Stunt Guy who died?

 

[Nightmare]

Was there? i ran out. My theatre was ridicously packed.

 

[beyond_death]

The first time I missed it, coz I left right when the credits rolled. It appears after all the Casts' names shows up, right before the rapid succession of names, I think.

 

[I am Batman]

Just saw TDK and I gotta say I was blown away by Ledger's Joker. Jack's got nothing on Heath. What the hell was with all the buzz last year about Javier Bardem's Anton Chigurh? That performance and character are nothing compared to Heath's Joker. If the academy doesn't nominate Ledger cuz his performance didn't make the cut, I can accept that. But if they don't nominate or award him because he played a comic book character I'm going to be seriously ticked off. I mean if they can nominate Johnny Depp for playing a whacked out pirate in a summer popcorn movie they can nominate Heath Ledger for playing a crazy psychotic murderer in a much darker and serious movie.

 

[sclabguy]

^ so true

 

[Goofball]

Did Ledger finish shooting as Joker before he passed away? I've avoided this forum at all costs so I wouldn't see any spoilers. So I haven't seen any recent discussions about this (if there even is one).

 

[Superhero 101]

So was there a memorium for Heath?

 

[DarthSkywalker]

So was there a memorium for Heath?

Yes.

I loved him so much. How he acts like a stuttering fool the first time he sees the mob is brilliant. Only for his true abilities to come out the next time you see him.

 

[tuffenoughtoroc]

At the Council Bluffs Iowa premiere, the entire audience stood up and cheered at the end of the movie when Heath Ledger was mentioned. He was brilliant in that movie! I loooooved the "pencil magic-trick" scene, hehe.

 

[Mr. Joker]

Heath was amazing, he deserves an Oscar.

 

[YoungE808]

Heath Ledger blew everyone in my theater away with his performance. Just absolutely fantastic portrayal of the joker.

 

[Mr. Joker]

Best villain ever.

 

[Drizzle]

I think the memoriam said "In Memory of Our Friends Heath Ledger and Guy Wickliffe". It was touching.

 

[Omega Wizard]

That shouldve been first in the credits...