Sept. 12, 2006

A year after the hype on "Brokeback Mountain" truly began, Heath Ledger now tries to live a life of relative obscurity. Wearing a grey print T-shirt, tan pants, shades (which never come off) and holding a tote bag of new kids' stuff that only he could make look cool, Ledger seems relieved to be a smaller fish in this year's big Toronto International Film Festival pond as he promotes his new Aussie indie film, "Candy."

Inspired by the life of author Luke Davies, the film is a melancholy and harrowing tale depicting the roller-coaster ride of two 20-somethings whose relationship teeters on their heroin addiction. It's also a surprisingly touching love story, which is what appealed to Ledger the most.

"Love is a big part of my life," Ledger says. "I adore it and whenever possible, I like to find a story that ... is attempting to tell a story of love. And that's what I found from this book, which is a complicated love story -- a love triangle really. The two of them and their drug."

Ten years after "Trainspotting," Ledger knows the junkie genre has been well covered, admitting, "I feel like we all know how to play a junkie."

But, that didn't stop the 27-year-old actor and his co-star, Abbie Cornish (likely the next great Aussie import), from researching their roles. The actors got lessons on how to properly shoot up from members of the Narcotics Users Association of Australia (really). And Ledger also credits Davies with providing additional direction, especially when the main characters are trying to detox. In one scene, Davies tell the actors, "One of you will be in a hot sweat and the other one is going to be boiling hot and then you switch. You're freezing and she's boiling hot. It feels like there are ants crawling all over you. You [defecate] your bed, you vomit."

Fun stuff.

Always one to fully commit to a role, Ledger ended up giving himself a black eye during a shower scene where his character tries to become sober again.

"The adrenaline is just pumping and you don't feel it until after," Ledger recalls. "Once I left the set ... somebody was looking at my hand ... and my knuckles were all peeled over [from the blows]. It was quite interesting."