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Joaquin Phoenix goes all out as Joker |
Director: Todd Phillips
Cast: Joaquin Phoenix (Arthur Fleck), Robert DeNiro (Murray
Franklin), Zazie Beetz (Sophie Dumond), Frances Conroy (Penny Fleck), Brett
Cullen (Thomas Wayne), Glenn Fleshler (Randall), Leigh Gill (Gary), Bill Camp
(Detective Garrity), Shea Whigham (Detective Burke), Douglas Hodge (Alfred
Pennyworth), Marc Maron (Gene Uffland)
The mystic of Batman’s nemesis the Joker is his
unpredictability, his other-worldly insanity laced with malicious viciousness
and an anarchic sense of fun. There is a reason such an electric character has
been the go-to for so many Batman related films – and why people are drawn time
and time again to re-exploring him. With the DC Universe struggling, it makes
sense that a stand-alone film around the most-popular, most-famous comic book
villain of all time would be attractive. It’s been a massive success, but is it
truly a good movie? I’m not so sure.
Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix) is a struggling professional
clown in 1981 Gotham City, living with his invalid mother Penny Fleck (Frances
Conroy). A run-down, dirty and no-good town with astronomical divides between
the haves and the have nots, Fleck is a guy who can’t make the world work for
him. Dreaming of a being a professional stand up and appearing on the popular
nightly talk show hosted by Murray Franklin (Robert DeNiro), Fleck is actually
a maladjusted, bitter outsider and fantasist who struggles to adjust to the
real world. Will the idea of taking brutal vengeance on those around him, be
eventually to tempting to resist? Hey: why so serious world?
Joker is a grim,
trying and rather uninvolving film that even contained within a fairly tight
two hours still feels like it drags on way too long. It perhaps feels like this
because it signposts all its major narrative developments far too far in
advance, meaning very little if anything surprises you. Fleck is essentially a
time bomb waiting to go off, and everyone knows by the film’s final act he will
do. The long wait to get there doesn’t really give us anything fresh or
interesting to think about, other than presenting a comic book world mixed with
the grimy atmosphere of classic Scorsese films. It’s a film made by people who
love classic urban Hollywood films – but who seem unable to bring anything
really fresh to a series of ideas better film makers have already had.
Instead it’s a film that relies heavily – in fact is
completely dependent on – its inspirations, torn from comic books, other films
and news bulletins. Your understanding of Fleck’s character arc is dependent on
having some sort of visual image in your head for the Joker. Your appreciation
of the film’s style and tone relies on you having seen Taxi Driver and King of
Comedy. Your reaction to the sudden growth of flash-mob violence in Gotham
depends on you knowing about these attitudes in the real world. The film
largely fails to develop any of these ideas organically within itself or its
own narrative, but instead throws them to the screen knowing that we will do
the work of making them stick on our own with our past associations.
As the film doesn’t really try and build its own ideas, or
really try to take ideas from anywhere else to really original places (apart
from a few Joker developments which I’ll talk about later), for people who are
familiar with its themes and inspirations, it just manages to make for a rather
dull watch. The Joker character has been done better elsewhere, King of Comedy and Taxi Driver are films so full of depth and interest around
maladjusted losers, stalkers and fantasists yearning for recognition, that this
film’s showy coverage of the same ground come across as deep as puddle. Its
political positions are so simple, basic and unchallenging that they might as
well have come from a school essay.
Both the film’s greatest strength, and its greatest
weakness, is Phoenix’s lead performance. There is no question that this is a
powerhouse performance, fully committed physically and emotionally. Phoenix has
explored every inch of the psychological make-up of a misfit who believes the
world owes him something and whose vulnerability eventually becomes twisted
into a psychotic rage. As a portrait of the making of a school shooter (say)
it’s a fascinatingly successful performance. But it’s also overwhelming. It’s
so quirky, so twitchy, so detailed, so mannered it finally becomes too much.
Finally, and this is perhaps intentional, it doesn’t feel
like the Joker. When I think of that character, I think of one defined by joy.
A twisted sense of joy, a psychotic killer’s joy, but joy nevertheless. Joy is something
that never enters Phoenix’s interpretation for a second. This makes sense for
the first three quarters of the film, but when the final push of the narrative
takes us towards Joker territory, Phoenix’s character is still by-and-large the
same tearful, desperate, tragic figure he was before. That doubling down on
villainy, that “just let the world burn” anarchism is something completely
missing from the performance. It makes the part something that is all impact
but no real depth, no real development. It’s a showy performance of tricks and
manners, impressive in its commitment but in the end empty and unaffecting.
It also means the film focuses almost completely on Fleck,
meaning it has not time to develop its themes of urban clashes and rich vs poor
narrative. Instead it just throws these ideas straight in to the film with no
real introduction or context and trusts that we will do the work ourselves. It
does the same with Fleck’s fantasies and obsessions. It’s no great surprise
that all these dreams fail to pan out, and it’s no great surprise that killing
ensues. All the victims of Fleck’s rage are completely predictable from the
first few minutes, but Phillips film feels like it takes a very long time to
get there.
Joker does at
least try to do something different, but Phillips film is more a scrap book of
ideas and themes explored better elsewhere. Phoenix tries too hard and the film
itself ends up telling a not very compelling story. In the end the character of
the Joker is fascinating because the character is unknowable, unpredictable, a
rootless force of nature. Giving him a back story weakens the character and
makes him (and the film) less and less successful. And the general get-out-of-jail card the film holds (and plays) that all or some of this might just be happening in Fleck's fractured mind isn't clever, it's just irritating.
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