Who portrayed the Joker better: Jack Nicholson or Heath Ledger?

Heath

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by John Devera

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Heath Ledger's Joker was phenomenal. But, then again, so was Jack Nicholson's. Heath Ledger never had the chance to prove his depth as an actor; he flared out too soon in a lightning bolt of talent that lit the sky for a brief moment. Nicholson, on the other hand, has demonstrated over the years that he is the most talented actor of all time. But that wasn't the question. Who portrayed the Joker best? That's a difficult problem because their portrayals were consciously different. Side by side, though, it is obvious which was the better performance.

YOU THINK YOU'RE CRAZY?

The Joker is the purest definition of a psychopath. He is a cold blooded killer. In his earliest comic incarnation, he was a rather straight-forward villain. He transformed himself into a clownish buffoon (with the help of Caesar Romero) with a twisted but always mean-spirited obsession about the batman. But, with the new generation of comics, from Alan Moore on, the Joker became more violent, more menacing and definitely more psychotic. So who was crazier, Heath or Jack. Well, Jack talking to the smoking corpse is one of the greatest moments in film history. Nicholson played the Joker as a psychotic fueled by ruthless revenge, egomania and pure genius. Nicholson is witty, and suave and, most of all, consciously self-interested.

Heat h Ledger plays a modern Joker. There's a humor here, too, but it's more than sardonic; it's sadistic and dreadful. Heath's Joker loves telling people why he's a psychopath, about his childhood and such. But we come to understand that none of those stories are true. Or all of them are. It doesn't matter. Heath Ledger's Joker is a sociopath savant. Heath was playing Joker as a kind of Iago (from Shakespeare's Othello), a malevolent and sadistic nihilist who has no need to justify his actions. He appears from no where and has no motivations that can be tacked down. He is schizophrenic, but more than that, he is a nihilist, believing that, in an absurd world, one cannot live by any rules.

ATTACK OF THE CLOWNS
Nicholson's Joker is clean and pretty, an avant garde art work in purple and pain. His look is a part of his psychosis because of the accident that left him disfigured. And that trauma is what sets him up as a super-villain. He becomes motivated by his damaged psyche that parallels his damaged face. What makes Ledger's appearance so much better is that his Joker is disgusting, dirty and in no way attractive. His charisma works solely on its own, with no help from dapper costumes or a fancy prosthetic. Instead, Ledger's makeup was a minimalistic mess, designed for a high creepy factor and low camp.

WHERE DOES HE GET THOSE TOYS?
Nicholson was great as the Joker because he fulfilled all the traditions of Joker-ness. He had uber-toys. He had Burton-esque balloons. He painted everything in horrible shades of purple and green and red. And he had lots and lots of really crazy henchmen to do his grunt work.

Ledger proved that real psychopaths don't have henchmen, they have victims who are too stupid to understand that you should never trust a psychopath. His puzzle isn't some high-tech, super-scientific Rubix cube. Nope. He builds two really big, really practical really burny bombs and sets them to go off at the same time. He doesn't allow the bat in a hat to figure out some clever way to foil the plan. Instead, he turns Harvey Dent into a raging lunatic and gives the batman a guilt complex. This guy is MEAN.

Ledger plays a cruel sadist. Nicholson plays a guy in funny clothes. Ledger's character is deeply disturbed and deeply disturbing. Nicholson's character is just really fun. Ledger throws away his quips and witticisms as he devastatingly becomes more and more vile and violent. Nicholson plays for laughs and even sympathy. Nicholson makes Batman a fun movie which little kids can enjoy. Ledger ratchets up the sheer terror and horror until The Dark Knight becomes a definite kid-unfriendly movie. Ledger is the Joker for adults, and for a nightmarish vision of the world.

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