Joker (2019)

[MT 917]

 

It actually doesn't look half bad.

[webhead 519]

I am cautiously optimistic about this movie.  I love Joaquin Phoenix and this movie looks fucking intense.  I hope it's good.  DC looks like they're starting to figure this shit out finally and I could not be happier.

[Tassifox 418]

I'm definitely interested. Heath Ledger eat your heart out.

[Galeigh 308]

I honestly still can't believe this was greenlit. 

[Tassifox 418]

Is that a good "I can't believe" or a bad one?

What I'm wondering is how Adam Tyduk got picked for the role in the Harley TV spin off but that can be for another thread.

[Galeigh 308]

Bad. A solo Joker movie is a terrible idea. The character only works when he is NOT the center of attention. 

[Tassifox 418]

Honestly depending on how this goes it might be pretty good.

[webhead 519]

30 minutes ago, Galeigh said:

Bad. A solo Joker movie is a terrible idea. The character only works when he is NOT the center of attention. 

 

I think you're being closed minded.  This has a lot of potential imo.  I'm not going opening night mind you.  Will definitely wait to see the reviews lol.

[Galeigh 308]

Phoenix could have the greatest Joker performance of all time and won't help this concept imho. 

 

The entire concept behind the Joker is this insane criminal whose background and motivations are so fluid and ever changing you can't fully grasp his intent. Making a movie centered around a character who is supposed to be unfocused will make an unfocused mess of a movie. 

 

When he is playing off of OTHERS though, he becomes this element of chaos to the story that can leave the audience guessing and the story moving. That's his gold spot. 

[webhead 519]

I think you're pigeonholing the Joker.  Wait and see.  I think this could be good.  Also I prefer to think of it as just one possibility among many rather than the definitive story of the Joker.  Makes it more fun.

[Mera'din 308]

Makes me think of a cross between Ledger's Joker and the old 1960's Batman Joker. Not sure how I feel about it, but there is promise there, and knowing Phoenix's acting ability I'm willing to wait and see how it goes before getting too judgmental. My knee jerk reaction is to not like it, mostly because I'm not sure I care for the aesthetic at all but there's promise in the pieces so I'm interested to see how it does.

[MT 917]

It's definitely not supposed to be a definitive version of the Joker origins. People have called it an Elseworld Joker film.

[Downshift 54]

6 hours ago, Galeigh said:

The entire concept behind the Joker is this insane criminal whose background and motivations are so fluid and ever changing you can't fully grasp his intent. Making a movie centered around a character who is supposed to be unfocused will make an unfocused mess of a movie.

It looks like they're focusing on his origin being purely his decent into madness and nothing to do with a sudden fall into a chemical vat or something.

A background based on an extreme and unique mental illness fits the "motivations are so fluid and ever changing you can't fully grasp his intent" concept pretty well I'd think.

[Tassifox 418]

On Shift's note ^


 

[MT 917]

 

[webhead 519]

This movie is going to be weird as hell.  Pretty sure of that.  I'm interested.

[Vic Boss 612]

(It was 10/10 great btw)

[MT 917]

Yeah, I really liked it. It was kind of a disturbing movie to watch, but I definitely enjoyed it.

[webhead 519]

Yeah.  Great movie.  Not one you want to really rewatch a lot but still really great.  I'm still not sure what all this dumb ass controversy is about.  Seems like people talking out of their assess.

[Vic Boss 612]

I think the controversy was that it made the incel killer potentially sympathetic, and normies think that stuff like this can inspire incels to copycat. Mebs some of it about gun violence, but I dunno about that one, there's like 800 movies that feature that released every year.

[webhead 519]

That's kind of what I'm getting at.  There are movies that glorify violence to a much greater extent and I have no idea what made this the target.  It doesn't even make sense.

[Garlic Junior 136]

Movie was ace. 

 

My favourite part was all the dumb giggling teens in the cinema I went to, laughing at awkward parts about mental health etc, shutting the fuck up when the movie took a turn.

 

Felt it was a solid 8/10 it was pitch fucking perfect until the rant really began towards the end. I docked it two points for Joker's complete characteristic change.

 

You can argue it was his meds.

 

You can argue he "snapped".

 

You can argue it was all in his mind.

 

I don't care, I broke my neck on the whiplash from sympathetic nativity to world-class enunciation and articulation of Big Ideas.

 

Tempted to add another point on though for:

 

Following this up with a framed cop car ride to subtly fuck you in the eye with memories of Joker's cop car joyride in TDK

 

Yeah. Fuck it. That and "that scene" in his apartment, fuck it, 9/10.

[Vic Boss 612]

 

 

"It's funny and I'm tired of pretending it isn't."

 

If we assume for a second that none of it is in his head:

 

He didn't snap, it's just like he said, he felt free because there was nothing anyone in wider normie society could do to him anymore. He was practicing to kill himself on Murray's show and then when he was actually there and rifling through his joke book, you can see how he seems to change his mind when he hits up that "I hope my death makes more cents than my life" quote in it. That same society that shit all over him and blamed him for it or tossed him aside like he was nothing, and that same society that celebrated him as a hero as the Clown Killer, was the same one that he could now do and say whatever he wanted to and the worst they could do was kill him, which he was planning on doing to himself anyways, or lock him up in Arkham, which is what he wanted anyways. He just started trolling them with the truth and it made them upset that it was true.

 

I think him killing Murray was also him shedding that last of Arthur. You could see his eyes a little wet and bloodshot like he was about to cry just before he did it, because he knew that this man who was his hero is just another finger-wagging high-society normie, which he probably knew at that point but might've retained a little last shred of hope.

 

(I also fucking loved that it was DeNiro. The man who played Travis Bickle getting incel kill'ed at the most climactic moment of what's basically the new Taxi Driver was incredible.)
 

 

 

Movie's probably extremely rewatchable for me too. The unreliable narrator and all the body-language shit (he walks with a limp and his head down, which we're supposed to believe came from his injuries at the beginning of the movie, but when he becomes a clown, all of that disappears, implying that most of what he does as Arthur is also an act. Shit like that)

[webhead 519]

Interesting take.  Maybe I will have to watch it again when it release on bluray.

[Garlic Junior 136]

@Death Rider Mox oh no, I'm fine with the whys, it's the how. How extreme a change it was.

 

It's not quite as extreme as, say, Rain Man turning into Barack Obama, but it certainly felt that way to me. It felt like, imagine watching Forrest Gump, except the movie ends with him tossing the box of chocolates away and legitimately saying "But forget all that shit, man I was a doofus back then, here's a beat-by-beat critical dissection of my own movie on a par with Roger Ebert because I have suddenly just this moment become so overly self aware I am now an entirely different person". That's how I felt.

 

But just for the rant. I just didn't believe that the man I had watched was the same man saying those words. In that moment, it felt like an actor reading words from a script. I didn't believe.