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Joker Movie Review

Joker is a 2019 superhero crime drama film directed by Todd Phillips and starring Joaquin Phoenix. It’s a flawed, but mostly very good movie.

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“The worst part of having a mental illness

is people expect you to behave as if you don’t“

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Isolated, mentally ill and basically disregarded by society, Arthur Fleck begins his descent toward madness. He starts killing people and becomes the infamous villain Joker. The film thus serves as an origin story to this great character and owing to its lack of superheroics, it’s basically a crime drama inspired by 70s cinema.

I personally found those 70s nods and connections overplayed as the film seemed less original because of them. The ‘Taxi Driver’ parallels in particular did not do it any favors. But the worst offender is the inclusion of those musical sequences.

In an effort to appear more artsy and different, the director included many older songs, choreographed dances and basically musical-like scenes that overstuff the movie to the exhaustion point as they were unnecessary to the overall plot and simply felt misguided. Of those, I only liked that staircase descent which was beautifully filmed for sure.

But thematically speaking, I really admired the film. It showcases how helping mentally ill, disregarded or bullied people is a priority for the society as not only are we helping themselves, but also others in the process as many of the worst serial killers had had terrible childhoods. I also loved the attack on the rich elite through a couple of powerful lines of dialogue. The movie isn’t original, but it says the right things, it has a great message and in my opinion it doesn’t glorify Joker or violence, but I can understand how some may get that feeling from it.

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This is basically a one-man show. And yes, Joaquin Phoenix is excellent in the role. He’s believable, his facial expressions are great and his laughter is terrific. He is undeniably superb here, but I personally dislike this overly calculated approach at a performance that he put in here, and him getting so thin for the role is not only stupid, but also dangerous and unhealthy. But yes, he ended up fitting the role like a glove.

The character is great, very well developed and his origin story is perfectly plausible even in the real world. Nothing here is unrealistic and that is why it succeeds as a strong crime drama with some great psychological thriller elements such as the scenes that emphasize mental illness.

I liked Robert De Niro quite a bit as talk show host Murray. That show with the two was probably the best scene of the movie and I loved all of the dialogue there. I also really liked how his mother was portrayed, and the glimpses into his childhood were very dark and disturbing. And of course, Thomas Wayne being portrayed as a bad guy was a superb choice in my opinion, and the glimpses at Bruce were all very intriguing. I liked those connections and they weren’t overdone at all.

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Joker is simply not particularly violent, despite the media proclaiming it as such. It’s never tasteless, but done just right and in the necessary amount. The score is fantastic and disturbing in nature whereas the cinematography is strong throughout with a couple of wonderfully shot sequences.

But the direction from Todd Phillips is overly calculated and not truly artistic as the entire film felt programmed in a way to appeal to awards people. But the dark tone, even the humor and especially the dialogue are all uniformly terrific, but the film could have been greater overall.

Joker is overly calculated not only in the titular performance, but also in the overall direction and approach. The 70s nods are excessive and the musical touches are entirely unnecessary for the plot and they overstay their welcome very quickly. However, Phoenix is terrific in the role and very believable whereas the film acts as both an interesting origin story for Joker as well as a plausible crime drama with a great message to boot. It’s also very well shot and scored. It’s a very good movie, but it could have been much greater.

My Rating – 4