The Archives > The 2009 Xixax Awards

Best Male Performance

<< < (3/4) > >>

Pas:

--- Quote from: Alexandro on April 07, 2009, 11:33:27 AM ---I agree with Stefen. We all got soft with The Wrestler but what Ledger did was just out of fucking nowhere. His performance has made the movie a classic. The Wrestler will be forgotten pretty soon.

--- End quote ---

To the contrary I think TDK has less importance than The Wrestler.

The Wrestler has very human themes and has a great insight on the world of wrestling but also on about growing old etc. Mickey's character is a fuck up not because of circumstances or bad luck, but because he himself is fucked up. Like when he's so happy to get his daughter back but forgets about their dinner etc.

TDK is just another superhero movie. What themes does it have, how can I relate to such characters ? Heath's performance is good, but the psycho-clown type of character has been done and done again. It's nothing fucking special. I remember talking with my gf about a guy on TV doing the psycho and we were like : ''yeah this is as good as the joker''

S.R.:
I just think Heath gave a performance that will go down in history as an all-time great performance. Mickey's performance was good, but it wasn't ICONIC the way Ledger's was.

As a movie, you can take the Dark Knight or leave it, but Ledgers performance stands not only above Mickey's performance, but above both the Dark Knight and the Wrestler as a whole.

Gold Trumpet:
Ledger's performance will go down as iconic, but mainly because he died shortly thereafter. James Dean didn't have an ounce of talent but yet is still able to mentioned with Marlon Brando way too often. I think Ledger's performance is good, but I don't compare it to great performances.

He's essentially playing a monster role. Give him the credit for imagining the Joker that way, but that majority of the role is based on his interpretation of terror. Ledger abandons all of his personal qualities to pull off the role, but in doing so, he makes the role very open to easy mimicry from other actors. Nicholson didn't have the writing to back him up in the original Batman, but he did a perfect blending of his essential qualities as an actor with a fightful interpretation of the Joker. People complain that Nicholson is playing himself, but that's not true. They are just mad that they see any of his personality in the role, but that's what he had to do. I think actors have to transform roles to the strengths of their talent. Nicholson puts enough of himself in the role to make it an acting job. To study Ledger is to apply the right amount of make up, copy the physical gestures and get the voice just right. I thought a lot of Ledger's performance hinged on the right ingrediants that Ledger decided were scary, but he kept the role very simple. I can see more actors pulling off Ledger's interpretation than Nicholson's.

S.R.:
^in that case, you could say the same thing for every great performance.

A good actor could mimic Brando's performance as Don Corleone as long as they slicked their hair back and perfected his mannerisms.

Robert Deniro as Jake LaMotta would be the easiest to mimic. All you need to do is gain some weight and talk like an Italian from NYC.

To me, what makes Ledgers performance to amazing is that fact that it's Heath Ledger. I always thought of him as the guy from 10 Things I Hate About You, then the gay cowboy and now as Joker.

Gold Trumpet:

--- Quote from: Stefen on April 07, 2009, 03:35:56 PM ---^in that case, you could say the same thing for every great performance.

A good actor could mimic Brando's performance as Don Corleone as long as they slicked their hair back and perfected his mannerisms.

Robert Deniro as Jake LaMotta would be the easiest to mimic. All you need to do is gain some weight and talk like an Italian from NYC.

To me, what makes Ledgers performance to amazing is that fact that it's Heath Ledger. I always thought of him as the guy from 10 Things I Hate About You, then the gay cowboy and now as Joker.

--- End quote ---

First off, I don't think Brando was very good as Don Corleone. I thought it was pretty caricature and have said that before. But, to get to your point...

Of course someone can mimic anyone's performance, but the point is that all  that goes into Ledger's performance is qualities that relate to mimicy. The one moment in the Dark Knight where Joker struck a different tone is when he disagreed with the mobsters on whether he was crazy. I think it was a sincere moment on his part, but the rest of the film is his interpretation of the Joker is wild and inventive, but all on a level of gestures and expressions. It's the fact that a villian like him hasn't been seen in movies before is what makes all of it so inviting, but it didn't strike me as the most thorough job with acting.

The point is to round off the character with qualities that go beyond the most basic gestures. It doesn't mean to make him sympathetic, but to give him dimension. There has to be aspects to him that are inviting and alluring in ways that aren't just easily frightful. There needs to be different levels to the layers of his psychosis. There needs to be a curiosity fact that there is something going on beyond the evil antics. Nicholson puts enough of himself in the role where those qualities come out more than in Ledger's performance. Yes, someone can mimic Nicholson still, but they will not to get to the heart of his performance. A good mimicry job could get to the heart of Ledger's performance.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page