People will be discussing Heath Ledger’s performance in “The Dark Knight” long after we’re all gone. His tragic death adds to the drama surrounding his Oscar, but the performance speaks for itself. It was stunning and completely original. He deserves the Academy Award, and it’s a shame he wasn’t around to accept it. It was heartbreaking to watch his family accept the Oscar with such grace and dignity.
Here’s the take from Bullz-Eye’s Jason Zingale.
For all the Oscar buzz surrounding Heath Ledger in the past few weeks, there still aren’t enough hours in the day to gush about his knockout performance as The Joker. It’s beyond phenomenal – a villainous turn so good that you never know what to expect next – and it puts Jack Nicholson’s cartoonish rendition from the 1989 version to shame. Ledger’s Clown Prince isn’t a one-dimensional goofball who listens to bad 80s music while parading around a museum – he’s a diehard anarchist who’s both smart and incredibly dangerous. Dressed like a bum with dirty green hair, smeared-on white and red makeup, and a hand-me-down purple suit, the Joker truly is the wild card he’s supposed to be. One minute he could be playfully entertaining his guests with one of many versions of how he received the smile-like scars on his face (when in reality, he probably just did it himself), and the next, he’s a nightmarish psychopath with the laugh of a rabid hyena.
