'Joker' Is a Compelling, Thought-Provoking Character Study of an Iconic Comic Book Villain

Joker is a non-DCEU film that aims to tell the origin of Batman’s greatest foe.  It centers on Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix), a mentally ill and impoverished party clown who struggles in his dream of becoming a standup comedian.  But the society around him is constantly nasty and apathetic, and life relentlessly craps at him.  Perpetually feeling isolated and oppressed, Arthur is gradually pushed toward madness, mayhem, and murder.  Meanwhile, he inadvertently becomes a folk hero to a fed-up, embittered lower class, whose resentful sentiments toward the ruling social elite are quickly reaching their critical boiling point.

Before this film was even widely released, it was met by significant media outrage.  Critics claim that making and releasing it was irresponsible because it would promote racially-motivated mass shootings or just violence in general.  Such assertion is, of course, completely ridiculous.  But they really made much stink about it.  The film isn’t even “certified fresh” at Rotten Tomatoes as a result.

It’s perplexing why a lot of these establishment critics hated it even to the point that they went out of their way to slander it.  Maybe because it goes against their narrative of guns being the reason of mass shootings as the film shows that mental illness is a more likely catalyst?  Or maybe because the film seems to suggest that the temperament and behavior of the leftist mob make them the kind of people that will hero-worship a villain like the Joker?  Or maybe because there’s no blatant virtue signalling in it?  Well, if the show fits… nah, I don’t know.  I will avoid making a definitive assumption on what was their reason LOL.

Anyway, the point is, because of all the toxic hullabaloo they raised, I went into Joker expecting really messed up things to happen in it.  To my shock, in comparison to other R-rated films, it’s pretty tame.  I’ve seen much more disturbing films.  There are brutal kills, sure, but the body count is minimal, and the violence isn’t even as graphic as other for-adults comic book movies like the Deadpool duology or Logan.  And, honestly, the wicked acts that this Joaquin Phoenix version of the Joker commits in the movie barely scratch the surface of what deprave and twisted deeds that a character like the Joker is capable of doing – and has done in other media (he didn’t even torture anyone in this movie).  I knew the critics were exaggerating, but I didn’t thought they were shamelessly grossly exaggerating this much.

In fact, it can be argued that violence isn’t a main focus of this film.  It is evident from the get-go that, despite its comic book background, Joker is not really action-oriented.  And though it’s categorized as a psychological thriller, it really comes off as more of a drama – a psychological drama, if you will.  The point is, it’s a drama first and foremost.  And whatever violence or any unsettling elements that come about simply happens to be in service to the dramatic direction that the film is going for.

Joker is basically a slow-burn character study of a downtrodden, broken man who is gradually pushed toward the edge by bad break after bard break and an apathetic, decaying society until he ultimately tips over to the dark side.  It’s actually a-dime-a-dozen story concept, but its narrative totally captivates nonetheless.  Firstly, it’s because its subject matter is an iconic comic book character.  Secondly, it’s because the presentation is superb and well-thought-out.

There’s this amazing scene where Arthur was in a comedy club, taking notes from a standup comedian’s act.  While the rest of the audience laugh at the punchlines, Arthur’s laughs were at parts that aren’t meant to be funny at all.  But those were the parts he found funny, not the punchlines.  He was notably offbeat with his brand of humor.  The intention of the scene is to display the dissonance of his mental state from the normal, and the execution is perfectly subtle and chilling.  That scene is just one of several which serve as testaments to how superb and well-thought-out the film’s narrative presentation is.

Director Todd Phillip is pretty masterful in helming this film.  Through his direction, the narrative unfolds in a gripping, well-paced manner, supplemented by high production value, beautiful cinematography, and a haunting score.  But the most important factor why this movie’s particular vision ends up being remarkable is Joaquin Phoenix’s powerful performance.

Phoenix delivers a master class in acting in this movie.  “Nuanced” is a word that is thrown around a lot.  But it totally defines to the work he did here.  Heath Ledger is still my favorite live-action Joker, but only because his character is more well-written, his character design is more striking, and he has the advantage of being pitted against a Batman (no Batman in this Joker movie).  But performance-wise, the two are arguably equals.  As a result of all these, Phoenix’s Joker may not be the best, but it’s distinctive, down to his laugh.  Actually, for a large part of the movie, Phoenix is Arthur Fleck.  Again, the arc is a slow burn.  But by its third act, it gets to a point where Arthur eventually “turns” into Joker, and I was like, “Yep.  That’s Joker alright.”  From that moment on, Phoenix’s Joker proves to be a legit representation of the character: nihilistic, solipsistic, and impulsive – acting without concern for consequences or tomorrow, and treating the moment he’s in as if it’s going to be his last. 

So, does this movie’s version of the Joker’s origin work?  I think so.  And it’s exactly because it’s a version of the Joker’s origin.  Let me explain, and I’ll get SPOILER-y now.

What makes the Joker one of the greatest comic book villains ever is because he’s the epitome of evil.  There’s no real cause why he’s evil; he just essentially is.  He’s a constant.  The Joker is what he is, not necessarily because society or a hard life pushed him toward madness and evil.  Joker is evil because he is evil.  His insanity – as well as his nihilism and solipsism and any other facets of the character, for that matter – is an offshoot of his evil nature, not the other way around. Joker does not do evil things because he is insane.  He does insane things because he is evil.

That’s why Joker requires no origin.  An origin will defeat that purpose.  An origin will somehow give a cause for his evil.  And great Joker “origin” stories understand this.  Thus, those “origin” stories are told through an undefinitive and unreliable manner.  In Alan Moore’s The Killing Joke, an origin story was provided for the Joker in which he became so because he fell on hard times.  However, it turns out that the Joker was just being an unreliable narrator all along, and in the end, his unsure of his own story’s validity – "Sometimes I remember it one way, sometimes another ... If I'm going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice!”, as he said.  It’s also the case with Heath Ledger’s Joker in The Dark Knight, one of the reasons why I love his take: he tells different, conflicting versions of how he got his scar, i.e. his “origin story.”

I believe Todd Phillips’ Joker also follows this principle, and that’s why it’s a brilliant Joker “origin” story.  In the course of the film, we see that Arthur Fleck occasionally suffers from delusions wherein he puts himself in fantasies that can become very real to him.  Thus, one interpretation we can get from the final scene, wherein Arthur is being interviewed by a therapist, is that the entire movie may be something that he has imagined in parts or in full.  The whole thing is just a “joke” he’s thinking inside his head.  The essential “unreliable narrator” factor of a Joker origin is at play all along!  He’s just another “version” of the Joker and how he came to be (after all, there are supposedly three of them!).  Heck, there’s even a solid argument to be made that Arthur Fleck is not really the Joker in the first place.  He’s just imagining that he is.  He may even believe that he is.  The ambiguity of the whole thing is simply brilliant and perfectly Joker-ian.

That brings us to one minor criticism I have of this film.  It doesn’t really need to be a Joker film at all.  I imagine that, at its earliest form, the script was that of an indie, arthouse-style psychological thriller that’s derivative of Taxi Driver, The King of Comedy, and American Psycho.  Seriously, if you have seen those three, you will pick up themes and beats in Joker that will make you realize that it’s heavily inspired by those movies.  But I think Joker isn’t really trying to hide this.  After all, Robert De Niro – the star of Taxi Driver and The King of Comedy – even plays a character in Joker; that’s pretty on-the-nose casting right there (also worth noting: coincidentally, the previous Joker actor Jared Leto was in American Psycho).  Anyway, Todd Phillips or some other studio executive probably got his hand on this early draft of the script, read it, and had a eureka moment:  “Hey, I have an idea.  Just a few tweaks here and there, and this script works perfectly as a Joker movie!  It will definitely sell more tickets that way.”   It’s just my theory, but it’s probably true in some form as even Todd Phillips implied this as much in some interviews I read.   If the movie wasn’t so dang well-made, this aspect would have been significantly detrimental to it.

All in all, Joker has a few flaws, but it’s still a compelling, thought-provoking film as a whole.  It’s absolutely one of 2019’s best cinema offerings.

Also, Joaquin Phoenix deserves to have an Oscar nomination for his outstanding performance in this movie.  I honestly can’t remember on top of my head anyone who’s had better this year.  He should be an easy shoo-in for it (unless, of course, there are enough SJWs in the Academy to screw him over).