Fade Out – Heath Ledger

5 responses to “Fade Out – Heath Ledger”

1. You know, Rob, I understand why you went with The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus as Ledger’s last film as that’s what it is technically, but my personal leaning would be towards his last appearance in a complete performance, which would have been as the Joker. Given that he had intended to film the entire role in Parnassus, using any of his footage in the final film and examining it critically feels like reading an unfinished manuscript from a writer or looking through the preparatory sketches in an artist’s sketchbook and treating them as finished pieces.

   I get why Gilliam et al decided to go with the solution they used. I mean, if you could have Heath Ledger, Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell all in the same movie, why hell wouldn’t you do that? But, part of me wonders if it would have been more respectful and better overall for the film to reshoot the scenes Ledger completed with a new actor and leave Ledger’s scenes as part of the special features on the DVD or something. I mean, both you and Max mention how the actor-switches don’t really work, and now the film is forever marred as the movie that needed a patch job because its lead actor died.

   Regardless, I agree with you both that Gilliam’s films are always interesting and singular experiences. And, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is no exception.

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2. Two Hands is a great crime film, kinda like Run Lola Run but with a single instance.

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3. Haven’t seen it, sounds interesting. There’s a morbid movie marathon to be made with this, The Crow, Canadian Bacon, et al.

   The Man Who Killed Don Quixote did indeed come out (I watched it for free on PopcornFlix), and liked it, though it meanders too much to be a masterpiece. Of course it doesn’t start who it was supposed to back when the project started, but Adam Driver is a thousand percent superior to Johnny Depp, and Jonathan Pryce is as perfect for the role of the errant knight as John Hurt was.

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4. Thanks for covering this. I tried watching it once but felt it was so bizarre I had a hard time getting invested. Might be time for a re-wacth.

   I will always watch Terry Gilliam’s films. I find so many of them delightful. Always innovative. But I find I revisit some of them (Time Bandits, Munchausen, 12 Monkeys) much more than others.

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5. Listening to you guys discuss this film reminded me yet again of the inclusion of archive Carrie Fisher scenes into THE RISE OF SKYWALKER. Ultimately, the choice to use footage of Fisher, or the unfinished Ledger performance in IMAGINARIUM comes down to two powerfully unwanted options, but that’s the tragedy of untimely deaths.

   On the one hand, there’s fidelity to the story, the script, the filmmaker’s vision. If that was the most important thing, Gilliam should have recast the part and reshot all of Heath Ledger’s scenes with the original intended script keeping the part all done by one performer. I think the movie would have been objectively superior to the compromised version we ended up getting, just as I believe THE RISE OF SKYWALKER would have been better without Princess Leia.

   On the other hand, filmmakers are human with emotional connections and sentiments, and to completely excise Ledger’s work from the film… yeah, that’s kind of cold blooded. I can definitely see certain filmmakers making that decision, but if you cared about an actor and his or her work and legacy, I understand the choice to compromise the vision to honor that actor.

   Are you beholden to sentimental attachments to a particular performance, or do you want to make the best version of the movie you can? Like I said, a difficult, almost impossible choice given the circumstances. Also, what might have happened if the movie was coming out ten years later and the facial graphics technology existed to put Ledger’s face on Jude Law for the whole movie?

   Anyway, great discussion, guys.

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