What's the best Oscars strategy for Heath Ledger in 'The Dark Knight'?
OK, now that legions of moviegoers are shrieking "Oscar! Oscar! Oscar!" after seeing Heath Ledger in "The Dark Knight," which category should he enter: lead or supporting?
That's a tricky Oscar question. On one hand you might think Heath Ledger should go supporting because, technically speaking, "The Dark Knight" is a film about Batman. But come on, Heath Ledger has the big, flashy role — he's the chief force bearing down on all of the terrifying action — and it's his spooktacular performance that moviegoers are storming theaters to see.
A good analogy might be Forest Whitaker, who recently won best actor in "Last King of Scotland." James McAvoy actually had the main role, as measured by the most dialogue and screen time, but his performance as a good doctor was dwarfed, crushed and left trembling in the shadow of his monstrous patient.
The same was true for Denzel Washington, who won best actor for "Training Day." He had less screen time than costar Ethan Hawke, but Hawke was so overwhelmed by Washington's performance as a ferocious, corrupt cop that he dutifully ducked into the supporting race and let Washington go lead.
Sometimes it's the size of the role, emotionally speaking, that determines whether it should be defined as lead or supporting. Sure, Anthony Hopkins only appeared in 22 minutes of "The Silence of the Lambs," but he won best actor because he gobbled up the scenery, the screen and everything else as Hannibal the Cannibal. Academy members didn't dare to deny him an Oscar statuette for dessert.
Heath Ledger's role in "The Dark Knight" is very similar to Hopkins' in "Lambs," come to think of it — so creepy that it continues to haunt moviegoers long after they flee theaters, terrified.
However, in terms of traditional category placement, Heath Ledger may have the best shot to win in supporting. When Jack Nicholson played the Joker in "Batman" in 1989, he was nominated in supporting at the Golden Globes (then was snubbed by Oscar voters, strangely).
And traditionally, that's where the cartoonishly crazy roles are put — Ben Kingsley in "Sexy Beast," James Coburn in "Affliction." And speaking of Coburn, that reminds us of another aspect of the supporting race that may apply to Heath Ledger: If he wins an Oscar in February for "The Dark Knight," it will largely be because Academy voters want to salute an impressive, if brief, career that included a past Oscar nomination ("Brokeback Mountain").
That qualifies Ledger as a perfect candidate for a veteran achievement award, which is the unofficial nickname of the supporting-actor category when it goes to the likes of Alan Arkin in "Little Miss Sunshine," Martin Landau in "Ed Wood" or Jack Palance in "City Slickers."
But, wait! Maybe it doesn't matter what category Heath Ledger lands in, since some Oscarologists believe he's doomed at the Academy Awards where only one star has ever won from the grave — READ MORE - CLICK HERE!
Photo: Warner Bros.
Why would you glorify a drug addict with an Oscar? His performance was definitely incredible...but what message will this send to the millions of people on planet Earth that are addicted to prescription drugs????? Hey, keep it up and one day we might honor you with a golden statue no matter how crazy those drugs make you.
Posted by: Scott L | July 19, 2008 at 08:48 PM
The Dark Knight one of the WORST movies that I've ever seen. I was a previous fan of the Batman movies. It is absolutely insulting to equate Anthony Hopkins' role in Silence of the Lambs to Heath Ledger's lackluster role in Dark Knight. There was very little plot and character development in the movie. BORING!
Posted by: N E Way | July 19, 2008 at 08:30 PM
Well the central character of the story is neither the Joker or Bruce Wayne, it's Harvey Dent. Just throwing that out there. Supporting.
Posted by: AJ | July 19, 2008 at 08:18 PM
What has happened to the Times? In the past year or so, the reportage has deteriorated to such a deplorable level, that one might posit that Rupert Murdoch purchased it one late holiday weekend evening, and no one took notice. Hollywood articles are usually mindless fluff, but the Times always seemed to rise above the herd with some intelligent thought given to their tinsel town reporting. But the title to this article: "What's the best Oscars strategy for Heath Ledger in "Dark Knight'?" is simply beyond comprehension. LEDGER IS DEAD: he has NO strategy, other than to decompose! What is your damage, O'Neil?! Are you not reading the LAT obituaries? They are by far the BEST obits in print or online, period. Or are you being merely ghoulish, hoping to see some ads taken out in Variety in Ledger's name; perhaps you envision a temporary reanimation on Oscars' night, courtesy of George Romero. Back to school, O'Neil: Journalism 101, LA County Community College.
Posted by: zhenjiu | July 19, 2008 at 08:08 PM
Being an avid Batman fan for just over thirty years, I have to say that Heath Ledger's portrayal of the Joker is eerily perfect and absolutely worthy of Best Actor (there shouldn't even be any other nominees), posthumously or not. Jack Nicholson's version was too campy and more like a cross between his role as Jack Torrance in "The Shining" and Cesar Romero's version of the Joker. Ledger's performance brought the Joker to a whole new level that highlights the Joker's diabolically psychopathic nature while allowing the character to be more realistically viable. And, as far as leading or supporting roles are concerned, Batman may appear to be the main character, but without his villians, he is just another person (fictionally speaking)!
Posted by: Ed Boulay | July 19, 2008 at 08:04 PM
Lead or support. Heath just has to win one or the other. This is a stellar performance that is so focused; he plays it as focussed insanity, maniacal in nature but you see how the joker sees logic or can justify what he is doing. the scene where he burns his part of the money take, he's killing for the thrill and Heath shows that well without ever going over the top.
Is it just me or do I see
Christian Bale doing a bit of Clint Eastwood in the angrier Batman sequences?
Heath uses his voice well. Because he is overcoming the strong Aussie accent, his enunciation of english is a bit forced, but it works cause he makes the joker sound like a geek. although she has less screen time, Maggie is better than Kate was but not as good looking. Overall I think this film is a solid 9/10 only about 15 min too long, some of the chase sequences could be paired down.I found myself missing Liam Neeson in this one though; too bad he had to die on that Ltrain that Bruce's dad built.
Posted by: Rick Kahn | July 19, 2008 at 06:46 PM
Does Heath Ledger deserve an Oscar or is it all Hype?
"The whole notion that Heath Ledger deserves an Oscar nomination is completely and unequivocally true. His untimely death may have put his performance on our radars, but his rendition of the classic psychopath, The Joker, is scary and mesmerizing and left me disturbed…Heath Ledger really does deserve the nod..."
http://coldpizzawarmbeer.blogspot.com/
Posted by: Mark | July 19, 2008 at 06:43 PM
Supporting Actor. But yes, that comparison to Anthony Hopkins in SOTL was an excellent one. That's the only thing making me second guess the Supporting category for Heath.
Rest in Peath.
Posted by: David Epstein | July 19, 2008 at 06:33 PM
Definately supporting. This article has a suprisingly strong article for lead, but in "Training Day", "The Silence of the Lambs", and "The Last King of Scotland", there were about two main characters, whereas "The Dark Knight" is a true ensamble piece, where Heath Ledger has about as much screentime as (or maybe even less than) Gary Oldman and Aaron Eckhard, who would undoubtedly go supporting if they were in serious contention for awards (sadly, they're not).
It's true that it is a flashy and dominating preformance (Ledger's screen time is also close to Christian Bale's) that reverberates throughout the movie even when he's offscreen, much like Anthony Hopkins, but those would just make it even easier him to win in supporting; it's no secret that big-almost-lead-roes-masked-as-supporing often win over blantantly supporting roles. And while Anthony Hopkins, Forest Whitaker, Denzel Washington, etc. all had many more oppertunities to win, this is about it for Heath Ledger; whoever handles the campaign shouldn't risk anything by trying to slip him in to the risky and crowdy lead category with no real reason.
And there's also the fact that this is a BATMAN movie; no matter how buzzed-over and anxiously awaited Ledger's preformance is, the movie is still based off of the BATMAN comic books and is part of the BATMAN movie series; Batman is already the pre-established main character. Compare that to Whitaker, who played an infamoulsy famous man (also taking lead over the James McAvoy character, who never existed) and Hopkins, who played the title character in the Hannibal Lecter series.
But either way, he totally deserves to win. It's an incredibly amazing preformance.
Posted by: Jack | July 19, 2008 at 05:30 PM
I'm very impressed with the performance the late Heath Ledger. I deserves to be nominated for an Oscar, MTV Movie Awards and many others.
Great Movie!!!
Posted by: Diana G | July 19, 2008 at 04:54 PM
He must go supporting, lead is always waaay to crouded and his role is really not lead. Supporting's right for him.
Posted by: Coni21 | July 19, 2008 at 04:42 PM