Ang Lee opens up about the “brilliant” Heath Ledger
Over the course of his illustrious career, Ang Lee has put together several iconic projects – ranging from Eat Drink Man Woman to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. However, very few have surpassed the cultural impact of his 2005 romantic drama Brokeback Mountain which starred Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal.
According to many, Brokeback Mountain facilitated the incorporation of LGBTQ+ issues in modern mainstream cinema. Featuring one of the best performances of Ledger’s career, Lee’s film became an indispensable part of the queer discourse in popular culture.
While talking to Empire about the 50 greatest actors of all time, Lee said: “Heath Ledger was a brilliant young actor. God only knows what he would have achieved later in life. He had so much talent – I’m sure he would have been a great director.”
The director continued: “Brokeback Mountain has the elegiac mood of a Western and an inner-twisted repression – Ennis is a very repressed character, macho but gay, gay but homophobic – and often there is no vocabulary to express his feelings. So Heath’s aura powers the whole story. He did a lot of preparation, mostly on his own. And he often surprised me with what he brought to his work.”
“We are all very lucky we were able to make movies with an actor of that calibre. He had a God-given gift,” Lee added. “He was so good with animals, too. When he sat on that horse, there was no doubt in anyone’s mind. He was a cowboy.”
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