The Dark Knight- Page 9

[lusciouslace]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 11:39am

Just to add a little something into the mix here...

Somebody mentioned that there was no backstory for why The Joker was nuts. Someone else mentioned that the script didn't develop that.

From what I've read that was a choice on the part of Heath and Nolan. Nolan has said many times that Heath had a very active part in developing this character from the beginning. He studied ventriloquism (which even Nolan didn't really get at first...) and worked with a voice coach. He's the one who came up with the idea of the smeary make-up, tried it at home and then presented the idea to Nolan. AND he and Nolan agreed that they didn't want a backstory for the guy. They wanted him to be anarchist and crazy and deranged...without ever really giving us a reason for it.

Just thought I'd add that. :)

[Q]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 11:48am

"without ever really giving us a reason for it"

I must have hallucinated the monologue about his abusive father while holding a knife in someone's mouth. Or maybe I'm the only one who thinks that what he described is enough to set a person on a path that led to the current reality.

[jrb_actor]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 11:54am

Well, he gives different stories on how he got the scars--suited for his victim perhaps.

I found the mysterious aspects of his character to be fascinating.

[broadway86]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 1:48pm

It IS a good performance, but what's noteworthy is that it's so much better than anything else he's done.

Yes, except for Brokeback Mountain.

Okay, well, as an actor with a trained eye, I couldn't disagree more.

Same here.

[rose_pearl]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 2:42pm

I'm seeing this in IMAX tonight. I'm so excited! Is it true they added scenes specifically for it?

[Sandy in Sable]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 4:05pm

The more we discuss this, the closer I get to the kernel of my feelings on the matter.

Ledger's Joker was very entertaining, I have never denied that. But when you mix the tremendous hype with my own personal opinions of what makes a great performance, it's there where I got let down. The physical character that he created, all of the external stuff was wonderful, but I guess I was expecting that *oomph* in the gut type of performance that would wow me emotionally, that certain "depth" as LePetiteFromage was saying. That's why I talk about "seeing the work" or what have you, because I wasn't super drawn in on an emotional level. And I wanted to be. I was more drawn in to the physical choices he was making.

With all the hype, I guess I was expecting John Hurt as The Elephant Man. One could argue that his prosthetic makeup carried 95% of the performance with which I would totally disagree. That SOUL, that man Hurt created was phenomenal, breathtaking. Unlike The Joker, I emotionally "went there" with the elephant man, and it's not just because he was a sympathetic character, but because Hurt created someone inside and out that I totally believed. I didn't sit there judging how real or fake the makeup looked the way I found myself dissecting The Joker's ticks and lip licks. Hurt WAS John Merrick for me, as others have said Ledger WAS The Joker for them. Maybe it's just a matter of personal taste.

But I can't deny the hype factor. I went to The Diving Bell and The Butterfly fresh, no background whatsoever. I thought it was an amazing, life changing film that deserved ALL of the hype that Ledger got for The Joker. But we're talking about a foreign subtitled film with no American box office stars opposed to a flashy high-budget summer blockbuster starring a young actor who was taken from us way too soon. That's Hollywood, that's the world we live in, and I understand that.

[jrb_actor]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 4:10pm

I'm sure there will be much written and discussed about this when he's nominated for the Oscar.

[rosscoe(au)]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 8:15pm

He wont be nominated!

[jrb_actor]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 9:39pm

But he will!

[shira467]

Posted: 8/7/08 at 9:40pm

Just saw it today - I really enjoyed it, about 1/2 hour too long.

[Q]

Posted: 8/10/08 at 2:07pm

Weekend estimates have THE DARK KNIGHT winning a fourth weekend in a row. The per-screen average is less than PINEAPPLE EXPRESS, but it's playing on 1000 more screens. It's still showing very strong legs.

And MAMMA MIA is pushing 250 mil worldwide.

[frogs_fan85]

Posted: 8/10/08 at 2:29pm

Here's the chart if anyone is interested:

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/weekend/chart/?yr=2008&wknd=32&p=.htm

Besting Pineapple Express by 3.5 million is quite impressive. The Dark Knight is going to have stiff competition next weekend though with Tropic Thunder and the Star Wars Clone Wars film opening. It should be able to pass the original Star Wars on the the all-time list by next weekend, making it second only to Titanic.

[adamgreer]

Posted: 8/10/08 at 3:13pm

Warner Brothers expects it to top out at about $520 million, which puts it solidly in second place all-time, but still well short of Titanic's $600 million haul.

Pretty impressive.
Dark Knight leads box office again

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 8/10/08 at 9:20pm

This thread is missing something...



There. That's better. :)

[Weez]

Posted: 8/11/08 at 2:05pm

Thank you Mr Midwest! There's a large part of me that's really disgruntled by Ledger and the Joker because I lovelovelovelovelove Harvey Dent as played by Aaron Eckhart, and he is getting very little love on the webbernets.

To me, good acting comes when an actor disappears inside a role.

I totally agree with Jasonf here. This is why I think Ledger made such a good Joker; because he was onscreen for about five seconds before I forget I was watching an actor named Heath Ledger playing a role in a film. It's very rare that this separation happens to me, completely dissociating actors from the roles they're playing because there's such truth/believability/whatever you want to call it to them, so I'm so so affected when it actually happens.

I must have hallucinated the monologue about his abusive father while holding a knife in someone's mouth.

That's hilarious. Did you fall asleep after that point? The Joker told at least three different stories about how he got his scars, which I'm pretty sure is cinematic shorthand for "this man is a liar". :P We got no genuine backstory. It's all stored in Heath Ledger's head; some was shared with Nolan, but none was shared with us.

Updated On: 8/11/08 at 02:05 PM

[Q]

Posted: 8/11/08 at 5:22pm

"Did you fall asleep after that point?"

Actually, yes I did - more than once. Oh, well.

[Q]

Posted: 8/19/08 at 2:16pm

Robert Downey, Jr. comments on THE DARK KNIGHT -

"... I saw The Dark Knight. I feel like I’m dumb because I feel like I don’t get how many things that are so smart. It’s like a Ferrari engine of storytelling and scriptwriting and I’m like, ’That’s not my idea of what I want to see in a movie.’ I loved The Prestige but didn’t understand The Dark Knight. Didn’t get it, still can’t tell you what happened in the movie, what happened to the character, and in the end they need him to be a bad guy. I’m like, ’I get it. This is so highbrow and so ****ing smart, I clearly need a college education to understand this movie.’ You know what? F*CK DC comics. That’s all I have to say, and that’s where I’m really coming from."

[LePetiteFromage]

Posted: 8/19/08 at 2:22pm

Updated On: 1/22/09 at 02:22 PM

[StickToPriest]

Posted: 8/19/08 at 2:26pm

I love Downey, Jr., but I have to disagree with him here.