JOKER
****
Director: Todd Phillips
Screenwriters: Todd Phillips and Scott Silver
Principal cast:
Joaquin Phoenix
Frances Conroy
Robert De Niro
Zazie Beetz
Brett Cullen
Shea Whigham
Bill Camp
Country: Canada/USA
Classification: MA15+
Runtime: 121 mins.
Australian release date: 3 October 2019
Previewed at: In season at Chauvel Cinema, Sydney, on 3 October 2019.
Todd Phillips directed and co-wrote this dark and deeply disturbing movie, Joker, the origin story of one of Batman’s craziest and nastiest enemies. Yes, that Todd Phillips, the director and one of the leads in The Hangover series! WTF? You couldn’t get further away from that comedic franchise if you tried. He explains that, “I love the complexity of Joker and felt his origin would be worth exploring on film, since nobody’s done that and even in the [DC Comics] canon he has no formalized beginning. So, Scott Silver and I wrote a version of a complex and complicated character, and how he might evolve... and then devolve. That is what interested me - not a Joker story, but the story of becoming Joker.”
His and his co-writer’s screenplay is set in Gotham (aka NYC) in the early ‘80s, when the city is under strain by a weeks-long strike by garbage collectors and public funding is being cut for social services. One of those affected, particularly by the funding cuts, is Arthur Fleck (an incredible act by Joachin Phoenix). He’s a guy with a disability that causes him to laugh hysterically when he’s under stress and the seven different medicines he needs will be difficult to purchase without state help. Like Joe (also played by Phoenix) in Lynne Ramsay’s equally dystopian You Were Never Really Here, Arthur lives with his elderly mum Penny (Frances Conroy) in a run-down apartment, seeing to her every need and her sole companion. He aspires to do stand-up comedy but, as his mum says, “Don’t you need to be funny to be a comedian?”, so he’s struck in a low-paying job as a clown for hire. Picked on and bullied by his co-workers and people in the street, Arthur has a rich interior life in which he’s a successful comic. As fantasy and reality begin getting mixed-up in Arthur’s head, life in the city starts breaking down, especially after the violent triple murder of three Wall Street businessmen on the subway. Soon, the ‘have-nots’, who a mayoral candidate named Thomas Wayne (Brett Cullen) has referred to as “poor clowns”, start rioting in the streets, many wearing clown masks. An unlikely break gets Arthur a spot on a popular TV show, hosted by his hero, Murray Franklin (Robert De Niro), but he insists in being interviewed dressed in his clown suit and introduced as ‘Joker’, much to his host’s initial puzzlement and ultimate annoyance. Asked whether he approves of the rioting, Arthur says “I am not political at all”, but his actions lead people to think otherwise and, incredibly, he becomes an unlikely hero to the anarchists rebelling in the streets of Gotham.
Joker openly references Martin Scorsese’s 1983 film The King of Comedy by having Arthur Fleck emulate Rupert Pupkin’s obsessive adoration of a television host. Of course, in that movie Pupkin was memorably played by De Niro (how meta!), and this obsession leads to violence. As Arthur says, “Is it just me or is it getting crazier out there?” Phoenix lost considerable weight for the role and he contorts his skinny body in a way that reflects the contortions taking place in his character’s head - it’s a bravura performance and his name will be listed in the Best Actor category in the 2019 Oscars because of it. The movie also benefits from a disturbing yet darkly beautiful cello score by the wonderful composer Hildur Guðnadóttir.
To their credit, the script and the actor’s interpretation of it contrive to make this deeply flawed man sympathetic. Who among us hasn’t wanted to dole out violent justice to some bully behaving badly? Or is that just me? The lack of empathy and compassion in the powers-that-be running Gotham have real-world doppelgängers in today’s society - in Australia, you just need to look at government treatment of people on Newstart, indigenous Aussies or refugees imprisoned on Manus and Nauru, among others, to see the comparison.
Since winning the Golden Lion award at this year’s Venice Film Festival, Phillips’ Joker has divided critics, many seeing it as condoning the sometimes-violent actions of so-called ‘incels’, but it’s really more of a comment on life in the contemporary world than the individual at its core. Arthur doesn’t hate women - he hates society. Little wonder he goes crazy.
Screenwriters: Todd Phillips and Scott Silver
Principal cast:
Joaquin Phoenix
Frances Conroy
Robert De Niro
Zazie Beetz
Brett Cullen
Shea Whigham
Bill Camp
Country: Canada/USA
Classification: MA15+
Runtime: 121 mins.
Australian release date: 3 October 2019
Previewed at: In season at Chauvel Cinema, Sydney, on 3 October 2019.
Todd Phillips directed and co-wrote this dark and deeply disturbing movie, Joker, the origin story of one of Batman’s craziest and nastiest enemies. Yes, that Todd Phillips, the director and one of the leads in The Hangover series! WTF? You couldn’t get further away from that comedic franchise if you tried. He explains that, “I love the complexity of Joker and felt his origin would be worth exploring on film, since nobody’s done that and even in the [DC Comics] canon he has no formalized beginning. So, Scott Silver and I wrote a version of a complex and complicated character, and how he might evolve... and then devolve. That is what interested me - not a Joker story, but the story of becoming Joker.”
His and his co-writer’s screenplay is set in Gotham (aka NYC) in the early ‘80s, when the city is under strain by a weeks-long strike by garbage collectors and public funding is being cut for social services. One of those affected, particularly by the funding cuts, is Arthur Fleck (an incredible act by Joachin Phoenix). He’s a guy with a disability that causes him to laugh hysterically when he’s under stress and the seven different medicines he needs will be difficult to purchase without state help. Like Joe (also played by Phoenix) in Lynne Ramsay’s equally dystopian You Were Never Really Here, Arthur lives with his elderly mum Penny (Frances Conroy) in a run-down apartment, seeing to her every need and her sole companion. He aspires to do stand-up comedy but, as his mum says, “Don’t you need to be funny to be a comedian?”, so he’s struck in a low-paying job as a clown for hire. Picked on and bullied by his co-workers and people in the street, Arthur has a rich interior life in which he’s a successful comic. As fantasy and reality begin getting mixed-up in Arthur’s head, life in the city starts breaking down, especially after the violent triple murder of three Wall Street businessmen on the subway. Soon, the ‘have-nots’, who a mayoral candidate named Thomas Wayne (Brett Cullen) has referred to as “poor clowns”, start rioting in the streets, many wearing clown masks. An unlikely break gets Arthur a spot on a popular TV show, hosted by his hero, Murray Franklin (Robert De Niro), but he insists in being interviewed dressed in his clown suit and introduced as ‘Joker’, much to his host’s initial puzzlement and ultimate annoyance. Asked whether he approves of the rioting, Arthur says “I am not political at all”, but his actions lead people to think otherwise and, incredibly, he becomes an unlikely hero to the anarchists rebelling in the streets of Gotham.
Joker openly references Martin Scorsese’s 1983 film The King of Comedy by having Arthur Fleck emulate Rupert Pupkin’s obsessive adoration of a television host. Of course, in that movie Pupkin was memorably played by De Niro (how meta!), and this obsession leads to violence. As Arthur says, “Is it just me or is it getting crazier out there?” Phoenix lost considerable weight for the role and he contorts his skinny body in a way that reflects the contortions taking place in his character’s head - it’s a bravura performance and his name will be listed in the Best Actor category in the 2019 Oscars because of it. The movie also benefits from a disturbing yet darkly beautiful cello score by the wonderful composer Hildur Guðnadóttir.
To their credit, the script and the actor’s interpretation of it contrive to make this deeply flawed man sympathetic. Who among us hasn’t wanted to dole out violent justice to some bully behaving badly? Or is that just me? The lack of empathy and compassion in the powers-that-be running Gotham have real-world doppelgängers in today’s society - in Australia, you just need to look at government treatment of people on Newstart, indigenous Aussies or refugees imprisoned on Manus and Nauru, among others, to see the comparison.
Since winning the Golden Lion award at this year’s Venice Film Festival, Phillips’ Joker has divided critics, many seeing it as condoning the sometimes-violent actions of so-called ‘incels’, but it’s really more of a comment on life in the contemporary world than the individual at its core. Arthur doesn’t hate women - he hates society. Little wonder he goes crazy.