For someone who did, you could say, take his role a bit too seriously in the Dark Knight, never really finding an inlet of release after the movie came about, it could be said, Heath Ledger became an immortal by virtue of the film. Rather more specifically, due to a powerhouse performance so incredible and alluring that even fans, as on date, haven’t really been able to fully come out of The Dark Knight.
In some ways, this wild and one of a kind tryst between the Batman, the actual Dark Knight and his nemesis, The Joker was such that one could say- the movie is still playing in the theatre but the audience just hasn’t left the building.
The film, thus, is still playing in the theatre of the audience’s mind! Why else would you have, every now and again, someone or the other, whether in your workplace, or in the family or if not, then in the bandwagon of the cousins come up with stuff like- “Dude, for some reason, I just can’t get over The Dark Knight.”
Isn’t that true?
Don’t we all have that crazed member of the family or in the wider circle of friends who comes up with something wise and so poignant about the Christian Nolan epic.
Having said that, what’s also important to remember is that behind every great movie, long before it becomes a big booming box office hit, is an intense body of work that truly comes to life thanks to intense performances. A performance so electrifying that their impact is more powerful than the whiplash being attacked by a T-Rex’s jaws!
In that regard, what Heath Ledger and Christian Bale did to their respective roles in the film was no less than some thunderbolt and lightening.
Recently, there emerged a strange sort of fact connected to the Dark Knight that had Heath Ledger at its helm of what is truly a moving factoid, if it must be said so.
So what is it? The following is what popular website called Cheat sheet had to say:
Heath Ledger asked Christian Bale to beat him up for real in ‘the Dark Knight’
One of the movie’s most compelling scenes is Ledger’s Joker and Bale’s Batman facing off in an interrogation room. The scene eventually leads to Batman landing a vicious assault on the clown prince of crime. But to add more authenticity to an already visceral scene, Ledger requested Bale to land real punches.
As you see in the movie, Batman starts beating the Joker and realizes that this is not your ordinary foe. Because the more I beat him, the more he enjoys it. The more I give him satisfaction,” Bale recalled to the Hollywood Reporter. “Heath was behaving in a very similar fashion. He was kinda egging me on. I was saying, ‘You know what, I really don’t need to actually hit you. It’s going to look just as good if I don’t.’ And he’s going, ‘Go on, Go on, Go on.”
Moreover, the fact that Heath Ledger kept slamming himself around and began to throw himself all over the tiles inside the movie set explains the degree to which he’d eventually go in making himself one with a part that would become a role of a lifetime.
All of these facts actually help one understand how passionately did Heath immerse himself into his body of work which ultimately makes The Dark Knight what it is- a truly captivating presentation of powerful human emotions narrated perfectly into a fast moving script whilst all around this epic exists ‘movies.’