A Heath Ledger Tribute: A Good Actor with a Small Resume

More people in America probably know that Heath Ledger is dead than know that John McCain won the South Carolina primary. While this (if it is true) speaks to how poorly informed all of us are about the current state of affairs, I feel obligated, since I have been saying so much about politics in recent weeks, to take a break and write something about Heath Ledger.

First of all, he was a great actor. This is hardly news. Anyone who had seen movies such as "Ned Kelly" or "Brokeback Mountain" could have told you the same thing. But, more importantly, he was an animating presence in films which, otherwise, were not great. "Brokeback Mountain," alongside "Crash," is one of the most overrated movies of the decade. I hope this has nothing to do with its politics, though it might. But, in my defense, I enjoyed the novella "Death in Venice" which, I feel, is even more explicitly about homo-erotic love. The problem with "Brokeback Mountain," I feel, was not that it dealt with homosexuality, but that it was unwilling to deal with homosexuality honestly. Instead, the movie presented the affair like a conventional Hollywood love story when they should have concentrated more on the theme of masculinity. But I digress. For all of the movie's flaws, Heath Ledger gave a flawless performance as the narrative's protagonist, Ennis del Mar (an unfortunate name, if ever there was one.) The performance was one that was great not because of the passion that it poured forth, but rather because of the passion which it held in. Ledger seamlessly communicated the repression; he actually seemed to feel it, and we thought that we could, too.

"The Four Feathers" is the only movie in which Ledger appears that I have seen before and will want to see again. The movie was savagely mocked, particularly for the casting-directors decision to give Kate Hudson a leading role as an English aristocratic girl. This criticism has merit. It was one of her worst performances to date. But Ledger and Djimon Honsou (or some such spelling) were capable enough leads to make the movie into a memorable experience; the movie also has some excellent, if also infrequent, action sequences.

There were other movies as well. The aforementioned revisionist western, "Ned Kelly," was probably the other notable of those that I have seen. Not that this movie merits repeated viewings. It was (and will continue to be) overshadowed by another Australian western, "the Proposition." Nonetheless, Ledger did a good job of making a heroic and charismatic figure out of a bank-robber. I still remember the emotional intonations of his lines.

And then, of course, there is "The Dark Knight." As you know, if you visit this blog from time to time, I have already predicted that Heath Ledger will be the best Joker to date, and considering that Jack Nicholson played the Joker, that isn't saying nothing. Of course, the audiences will flock to see what may be the last movie in which Heath Ledger appears (there were other projects in production, but these may or may not be shelved depending on where they are in the process). Even so, it's tragic that there wasn't more.