LA Times: Dark Knight Joker "no laughing matter"

[docm]

Link....<br /><br /><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p><b>'Dark Knight' sneak lights up IMAX screen<br /><br /><i>Heath Ledger's Joker is an edgy character. But eager fans of the Batman franchise will have to wait until July to see.</i></b><br /><br />By Geoff Boucher, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer<br />December 7, 2007<br /><br />"The Dark Knight" is one of the most anticipated movies of 2008, and for months Batman fans have been debating the film's biggest wild card: the choice of Heath Ledger as the Joker, a role that comes with the considerable challenge of filling the clown shoes so memorably worn by Jack Nicholson back in 1989.<br /><br /><b><font color="yellow">If the first six minutes of the film -- shown Tuesday night in an invitation-only sneak preview at the Bridge Cinema's IMAX -- are any indication, Ledger and director Christopher Nolan have come up with a grim new interpretation of the villain that is no laughing matter.<br /><br />"I believe whatever doesn't kill you simply makes you . . . stranger," Ledger says as he stands over an employee during a bloody heist at Gotham National Bank. His white-chalk complexion and green hair are there, but this scarred-up Joker looks more like the title character from "The Crow" than like Clarabell.</font>/b><br /><br />The footage was shown in IMAX 2-D and the event was attended by Nolan, who welcomed a small audience with a brief description of the IMAX process and described it as something he's wanted to use for 15 years. Afterward he lingered at a reception and chatted about his return to Gotham and the characters who populate that world.<br /><br /><b>"Heath's Joker is like none we've seen before, but it's also very true to the iconography of this character," Nolan said. "His work is very compelling, and it's not easy to describe what Heath has accom</b></b></p></blockquote> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[PistolPete]

That being said, Ledger has got his work cut out for him if he is going to try and top Jack Nicholson's Joker. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><em>So, again we are defeated. This victory belongs to the farmers, not us.</em></p><p><strong>-Kambei Shimada from the movie Seven Samurai</strong></p> </div>

 

[docm]

A classic performance indeed, but we've seen multiple good performances in the same part before. See the various versions of "The Front Page", "Doctor Who", "Batman....." (Keaton, Bale), "Superman" (LL: Kidder, Noel Neill etc.). <br /><br />Of course it helps to have great characters to start with. <br /><br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[shadow735]

Heath Ledger was found dead from an apparent overdose of sleeping pills. This pretty much sucks I loved this actor.. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[nuaetius]

But the up side is Dark Night is now The Crow redux.<br /><br />No matter how bad the movie is it will not KILL in the box office.

 

[drwayne]

I think I mentioned somewhere that the publicity shots I had seen of the Joker made him look quite a bit like a Crow - drat....<br /><br />Wayne <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p>"1) Give no quarter; 2) Take no prisoners; 3) Sink everything."  Admiral Jackie Fisher</p> </div>