No One Is Laughing Now - Joker
Take a black piece of paper. Use a black magic marker to cover every inch of it. Envelope that paper in a black blanket and shoot it off into space. That is how dark Todd Phillips’ Joker is. A far cry from his roots with comedic films like The Hangover and Borat, Phillips has decided that what the world needs now is his take on Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver. In order to get that made, he wraps it in a certain amount of Batman lore. But make no mistake, this is not some DC Comics romp. Even Christopher Nolans Batman trilogy can’t hold a candle to the depths we reach here. This is a portrait of unbridled darkness and the twists that can bring to the world.
Arthur Fleck (played by Joaquin Phoenix) works as a clown for hire. He is on several medications for various mental illnesses and he lives in a rundown apartment with his aging mother. He has dreams of becoming a standup comedian and works at his craft by performing at open mic nights in his off hours. When more and more traumatic events start to unfold in his life, Arthur is ill-equipped to deal with them and turns to violence as the solution to his anger.
The backdrop for this descent into mental illness is a charged political landscape built on the back of economic angst and general unrest. An act of violence by Arthur turns his clown makeup into the unifying visage of rebellion and upheaval. In the end, Arthur’s deteriorating mental state and Gotham’s deteriorating social system spiral into a crescendo that portends the kind of chaos that leads to Batman’s eventual emergence.
It is so hard to remove a movie like this from its political context and consider it for the art it is. This version of the Joker is something between the socially isolated white anger of mass shooters like Dylan Roof and Adam Lanza on the one hand, and the radical ANTIFA forces looking to suppress racist demonstrations on the other. Either way, it glorifies a certain brand of violence that seems not only politically salient at the moment, but terroristic in nature given its outsized impact on our civil society. So as a political document, the movie frightens me and I wish it existed in a vacuum.
Part of what makes it so scary as an addition to the conversation is precisely because it is so effective. There is a certain ease with which Phillips approaches this subject. Using a veritable multi-tool to craft scene after scene of exemplary work. The film is, at least in parts, a masterpiece.
But the reason the film is able to reach those heights is in large part due to the otherworldly work Joaquin Phoenix is doing here. His Joker is so unnerving with his off-putting physicality and unpredictable shifts. He brings something truly different to the role once inhabited by legends like Jack Nicholson and Heath Ledger. While Phoenix’s Joker is more akin to the dark turn Ledger provided, there are entirely new elements here. This is the first time, for instance, we see an introspective Joker—fully aware that there is something wrong with him, but unable to do anything about it. This, and so many other mysteries inserted along the way leave a number of possibilities when it comes to a sequel. Let’s just hope the world is in a better place by then if Phillips decides to make the Vantablack® of movies.
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