The Dark Knight and Hillbilly Heroin

"The Dark Knight" has a 94% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, so we are hot to see it this weekend.

The reviewers are writing intellectual stuff like how this film is post-superhero, way beyond "truth, justice and the American way," a film for the era of Bush/American decline, etc. They can't get enough of Ledger's Joker. As the New York Times puts it: "his Joker is a creature of such ghastly life, and the performance is so visceral, creepy and insistently present that the characterization pulls you in almost at once."

Yet I can't help but think about the toll his work in this movie took on the life of Heath Ledger.

As a crime writer, I know how it feels to get inside the head of a truly evil character. Ledger, when he was playing Joker, couldn't sleep. He said his mind kept racing. He was taking Ambien® to get to sleep but one tablet was not enough. He took two and would go into a stupor for a few hours and then still could not sleep. I wonder if he bothered to read the side-effects of Ambien®:

In primarily depressed patients, worsening of depression, including suicidal thoughts and actions (including completed suicides), has been reported in association with the use of sedative/hypnotics. … There have been reports of people getting out of bed after taking a sedative-hypnotic and driving their cars while not fully awake, often with no memory of the event.

In other words, one Ambien® can mess up your mind.

Ledger died of an apparent overdose of prescription drugs. This is an increasing problem -- according to the New York Times, July 18, 2008, accidental poisoning deaths among adolescents  went from 839 to 2355 in just five years.

According to the autopsy, Ledger had been taking:

Ambien® – a central nervous system depressant

Oxycodone – This is an extremely powerful narcotic made from morphine that is prescribed to dying cancer patients for severe pain. Hillbilly Heroin or Oxy is an opiate like heroin and very very addictive. When my sister died of cancer, I had to count out each of her leftover oxycodone pills in front of a nurse and put them in the garbage disposal. You don't mess with them.

Hydrocodone – Another opiate in the heroin family, derived from morphine. It too is very addictive. It's an ingredient in Vicodin® , number one in prescription drug abuse.

Diazepam (Valium®), Temazepam and Alprazolam (Xanax®) – These are benzodiazepines, used to for anxiety disorders, panic attacks, and depression. The Rolling Stones call them "mother's little helpers."

Hydrocodone and Oxycodone both cause drowsiness, slowing of the heart beat, dizziness, light-headedness, slower breathing and nausea. Benzodiazepines likewise make you sleepy and muddy-headed, and ruin your judgment, which could explain why Ledger did not have the sense to stop mixing drugs.

People build a tolerance to these drugs – they need to take more to get the same effects. In this way, these drugs can actually cause more anxiety and start a vicious circle where you are anxious with racing thoughts and need to take more to calm down and get high.

The newspaper reports wrote about Ledger's death: The medications found in the toxicological analysis are commonly prescribed in the United States for insomnia, anxiety, depression, pain, and/or cold symptoms.

This is, of course, bullwash.

They are prescribed for extreme conditions like cancer, and they are certainly NEVER commonly mixed up in the same person's body.

When you think about this poor man's autopsy, you just have to wonder about how much psychic pain he was bearing. He had used drugs to self-medicate but he had completely lost any sense of what he was doing, unless he was actually suicidal. The kindest thought is that using these drugs had so clouded his judgment he no longer could stop and think about how self-destructive he was.

Enjoy the movie.

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Update: I saw the movie last night and liked it. Ledger seemed to me to be on speed -- he was almost manic. I thought how hard it must be to be young and handsome and not to be able to use either in your performance. To be compared to actors like Jack Nicholson. To have to carry a movie that costs millions and millions of dollars. The pressure must have been tremendous. No wonder he needed downers.