I watched the Dark Knight last evening, 10/10 simple as that but I want to talk about Heath Ledger. A good friend of mine were discussing one evening about who she thought was beautiful and she came up with Heath Ledger. Now I know she’s not jumping on the Ledger tradegy story here, so today I did some digging. These photos are from Flixster.
This photo above is how I imagine most people see Ledger, a guy who has modesty and a uncomplex view on life, but as we know there was something darker within him. Looking through Google to find out more photos I struggled to find the darker ones; I believe an actor who can play the Joker that well must know something about real pain. However, where are these photos, the moody brooding ones? The ones where it tells THE story about the man behind the actor?
This black and white shot of Ledger relaxed against the fence is a rare moment where he has let his guard down a little. Forget the fact that this was an A-List actor, the man looks like he’s dealing with some duality of something which I cannot possibly know. I personally think this is a more ‘honest’ photograph than the others of the smiling & playful man.
The best advice I read on how to shoot photos was to get the eyes; the eyes are so important to telling most of the story. The body could be playing the clown, the feet could be dancing but the eyes rarely lie. In this photo of Ledger his eyes seem distance. I’m not sure if this shot is from a film but to me it’s one with depth.
I have always liked photos where the subject is looking down, because when someone is looking down then they are somewhere else in their mind. They are not thinking about their immediate surroundings, nor are they engaging with anyone around them. They are simply themselves at a vulnerable moment. In the photo above Ledger is probabaly looking at his shoes, I don’t know for sure, but what I do know is he’s very relaxed by the way his upper forearm is resting on his knee and his body is leaning forward to shows openess. Even though it doesn’t show his face clearly there is an intimacy showing through.
I don’t pretend to know the man at all, I merely wanted to explore the man on a very shallow level. Ledger was clearly talented and like James Dean I do not believe he had reached his best yet…
One Comment
I believe he never got over his parents divorce when he was a child. Also he suffered from severe anixety problems. When he was offered the Spiderman franchise he went in the bathroom and started crying.