Joker

I'm late to the party, but I just saw "Joker" and I must say this is one of the best superhero-related film I've seen in a long while. Sure, the MCU films are good and great fun in a roller-coaster kind of way, but there is room for a more in-depth approach to the superhero genre, as was proven by "Logan", which is one of the best superhero films to date in my opinion. Warning! Spoilers ahead!

_{Image by AntMan3001 - source: Flickr}

There is so much to say about Joker, but let me start with this: this is a beautifully shot film with some daring social and political commentary and great acting. We are witness to the life of Arthur Fleck, a man who lives with, and takes care of his mother in a downtrodden part of Gotham City, works as a clown, is in therapy at a publicly funded agency that provides mental care, and runs into misfortune every step he takes. The film fools us into thinking that we'll be treated to the standard path towards the creation of a psychotic mass-murderer; he loses his job, the mental help is stopped due to austerity, he is taken off his medication and so on. For a while, during the first and second act of the movie one could think (as I did) that it's all too predictable: I expected this standers run down the ladder to end up with Arthur just losing it and starting to kill everyone he felt was guilty for his extreme misfortune in life, becoming the Joker.

But that's not what happens. Before I go on to describe what does happen, I must first make a few important points. First is that this film brilliantly takes the opposite perspective from your typical Batman movie. Bruce Wayne (Batman), and by extension the Wayne family, is always pictured as the ultimate philanthropist billionaire who does only good things for the people of Gotham city, to the point that Bruce even puts on a cape and goes on to fight criminals in the dark of night. In Justice League Bruce is asked by The Flash what his superpowers are, to which Bruce answers: "I'm rich." Wealth as a superpower; there's no arguing against that, and there's no arguing against that this superpower is generally depicted as a benevolent one, but rarely in such a direct and literal way as in the story of Bruce Wayne. This, in my opinion, is also the main reason why the film did so bad in the mainstream media; it's decidedly against the usual narrative used to maintain the current status quo that's so important for the elites.

Joker takes the exact opposite perspective and position: Bruce's father, Thomas Wayne, is a very unpopular figure, as his billionaire class is seen as the cause of the rampant poverty and misery among the common folks. There are regular protests against the 1%, from the start of the film there's a general strike from garbage collectors, adding to the overall dirty and gritty feel of the story, all of which is shot in absolutely beautiful scenes of some of the ugliest urban sights imaginable. I don't know who did the score of this film, as I just finished watching it and just spitting out first thoughts, but it is beautiful and mesmerizing, haunting and alluring all at once, making for a perfect marriage with the visuals and events.

The next wonderful trick this film plays on its audience, well, on me at least, is the becoming of Joker; Arthur Fleck's fall into even deeper madness is at the same time his rise to the iconic figure of Joker. His fall is his rise, his rise is his fall, which perfectly mirrors Batman's story, who falls and rises in the opposite direction. Confusing? Consider what Arthur Wayne said to Bruce, most notably when the latter fell into the pit that would later become the Bat-cave: "Why do we fall, Bruce?" to which Bruce has learned to answer: "So we can get back up." Bruce was already on top, but had to fall to become even more. Arthur was already on the bottom, but had to fall even further to "rise" to become the Joker. Arthur was at the bottom because Wayne was at the top, or at least that's what the film conveys; another brilliant move in my opinion.

To further match the greatest protagonist-antagonist pair in comic book history, this film combines their origin stories brilliantly. For a short spell Arthur is even under the impression that Bruce's father, Thomas Wayne, is his biological father! And Thomas Wayne is murdered during the popular uprising that's caused by Arthur Fleck's last act of violence, the murder of Murray Franklin, the popular talk-show host who betrays Arthur one time too many. Arthur even learns that his own mother has betrayed him his whole life, and that she was "mentally challenged" herself, had mistreated him as a small child, and had lied about Thomas Wayne being his biological father but instead had adopted him. The film speeds up significantly during these events as all of life's misfortune come together at once for poor Arthur, and he utters the most telling and central line of the entire film:

"I used to think that my life was a tragedy, but now I realize, it's a fucking comedy." - Arthur Fleck

All his life he wanted nothing more than to become a stand-up comedian, he wanted to make people smile, like his "mother" always told him to do, but he has no talent for this at all. But he does learn that lashing out against those who betray him, brings him the attention he always craved but never got from anyone. The social worker who gave him mental aid in weekly sessions never listened to him and asked the same boring questions week after week. Not even his "mother" was straight with him, and the talk-show host he admired all his life betrayed him by making fun of him on his show. After shooting that host on life TV, his rise to becoming the Joker is complete. This story couldn't have worked without the magnificent acting by Joaquin Phoenix who, unlike Jared Leto in Justice League, makes for a worthy addition to the line of Jokers on film, like Jack Nicholson and Heath Ledger; I still believe Ledger's interpretation is slightly better, but Phoenix has my vote for any future Joker project.

These are my thoughts in very broad strokes; I haven't even mentioned the imaginary relation he had with the girl next door or the mental condition that makes him laugh uncontrollably when under stress or how his following becomes a mob with all people wearing a clown's mask, much like the crowd in the equally brilliant V For Vendetta, and how important that theme of wearing masks over our true selves is in the film. It's not a feelgood movie by any stretch of the imagination, and I'm sure there will be people who love it and people who hate it, but for me this is, up until now, the movie of the year; I loved every minute of it!

_{JOKER - Final Trailer - Now Playing In Theaters}

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