on a sad note

As this blog is as much about film and New York as it is about my odd quirks, it would be wrong to not observe actor Heath Ledger's untimely passing. Normally, the public reaction to a celebrity death highlights the more morbid aspects of fan adoration. Craving details, taking pictures, thrusting microphones in the faces of friends and loved ones. We'll never know the truth. And that's fine. It's none of our business.

The truth is that Ledger was a very talented actor. It's a loss to the film community, and one that stings because he was so, so very good. His turn in Brokeback Mountain did recall, as The New York Times suggested at the time, the work of James Dean, Sean Penn, or a young Marlon Brando. He brought power, control and restraint to a tough role, and gamely related the depth and conflict of a complex, taciturn character. Above all, he moved me.

I was talking with a similarly shaken friend earlier today, and we concluded that not only has our generation lost one of our own, but our community has as well. Recently, Ledger had become a New York fixture. When he and ex-fiance Michelle Williams moved to Boerum Hill with their daughter Matilda, they become the darlings of Brooklyn, poster children for the brownstone lifestyle. When they split and Ledger fled to Soho, an entire borough felt jilted. And like any loss in the communities in which we live, it feels close by. I've walked by that loft countless times, it's just a few blocks away from the bookstore where I volunteer. At moments, especially with the media coverage, it all feels within walking distance.

It will be interesting to see how we write the Ledger narrative. Like other public figures who go too early, we will construct a myth. Will it be a cautionary tale of reckless, wasted youth (see River Phoenix, Cobain), or a story about someone stolen from us, unfairly, who quickly achieves iconography (Dean)? I suspect the latter, with images of Ledger in his cowboy garb (like the one above) reaching the same matinee idol heights as Dean wearing a white t-shirt and smoking a cigarette in Rebel without a Cause.

We'll see. The certain truth is that, at least for this finicky moviegoer, he will be sorely missed.