Directed by: Todd Phillips
Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Robert De Niro, Zazie Beetz, Frances Conroy
Rated R, 122 minutes
In the 1966 movie “Batman,” the Joker introduces himself by sending an exploding shark to pull, literally, on Batman’s leg. In Tim Burton’s 1989 version, the Joker is born when Jack Nicholson falls into a vat of bubbling, smoking green chemicals. In other words, his brand has been camp, historically, but ever since Heath Ledger’s Oscar-winning performance in “The Dark Knight,” the character has inexplicably become a vehicle for grimy perversion, the kind that makes method actors drool. “Joker” continues this trend, doubling down on this interpretation of the villain and portraying his rise with a brutal aesthetic entirely unexpected for a comic book movie.
Joaquin Phoenix (“Her”) stars as Arthur Fleck, a gaunt, mentally ill man whose descent into madness spawns the Joker persona. At first he is just a clown for hire in Gotham City, subjected to relentless bullying from strangers. He takes care of his mother (Frances Conroy, “Six Feet Under”), he keeps a journal filled with jokes for his stand-up routine, he dreams of appearing on a late-night talk show. In other words, he’s a nobody, and acutely aware of his nobody-ness. Then he acquires a gun.
The events that follow—murders, yes, but also riots and hallucinations and delusions of grandeur—are deeply upsetting, but they constitute for Arthur a rebellion against the system that has always kept him down. Director Todd Phillips (“The Hangover”), known more for comedies than grim thrillers, proves adept at building tension, with evocative visuals and an unflinching camera that forces us to watch the most uncomfortable moments up close, sometimes even in slow motion. Meanwhile, the script, which Phillips co-wrote, stays tightly structured, even while its protagonist unravels. If nothing else, “Joker” is a reintroduction to Phillips as a skilled dramatic and technical filmmaker, suggesting he has a fruitful phase of his career ahead of him.
However, the movie aspires to be much more than an exercise in technique. Phillips and Phoenix have been reluctant to acknowledge the movie’s political context, but it hides in plain sight; from the repeated diatribes against the wealth gap to the depictions of anti-police sentiment, “Joker” is unmistakably possessed of our moment’s populist rage.
The problem with anger, though, is that it’s difficult to aim. Arthur’s is partly justified—the city has cut funding for the psychiatric services he’s been getting; his mother has concealed a history of abuse from him; a wealthy talk-show host ridicules him on the air—but the victims of his peculiar brand of terror are often victims of those same kinds of injustices. The movie asks us to sympathize with him, even while he abuses those closest to him and wreaks havoc for everybody else. And while he blames his breakdown on his mistreatment, the movie also stokes fear in his unnamed mental illness, as if to suggest that those suffering from such afflictions are one bad day away from a violent explosion.
It’s to Joaquin Phoenix’s credit that he conveys Arthur’s psychosis with humanity, without making Arthur a caricature. His Joker feels like a true anti-hero, his discontent with the world matched only by his self-loathing. In one scene, he pulls the food and shelving out of his refrigerator and climbs inside, shutting the door behind him. When he eventually says “I used to think that my life was a tragedy, but now I realize, it's a comedy,” the resignation behind his awful high-pitched laugh is palpable. Phoenix is surely one of the most committed actors working today, and his transformation into chaos is as memorable as it is unsettling.
Still, it’s a fine line between ambition and self-indulgence, and “Joker” treads that line precariously. It’s possible to see the movie as a mirror held up to the ugliest parts of our world—the anger and division, the toxic relationships, the fear of strangers. But Arthur’s rise to fame could also be read as a justification of his actions, another allowance for mediocre men to act without consequence. The movie might shock with aplomb, but it struggles to make meaning, relying on the mere presence of set pieces and plot points, and not the connections between them, to guide us. Like a jigsaw puzzle waiting to be made, all the pieces are there, but the bigger picture is hopelessly scrambled.
Originally published in The Harvard Press on 10/11/19.