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Dragonlord’s Review of JOKER: FOLIE A DEUX (No Spoilers)
Bottom Line: Despite another stellar performance by Joaquin Phoenix, some beautiful cinematography and imagery, Joker: Folie a Deux bombs due to the thin plot with little to no payoff and a quasi-musical experiment that felt flat and intrusive.
Joker (2019) was originally planned as a standalone movie with no sequels. After the film became a smash hit, reaching $1 billion worldwide, Warner Bros. offered a ton of money to writer-director Todd Phillips and star Joaquin Phoenix to come back. Unfortunately, Phillips didn’t really have a good vision for the sequel. He only had concepts of a plan.
One of the major problems with Joker: Folie a Deux was that it felt like Phillips didn’t really have a good story to tell for the sequel. The first Joker movie was modeled for the most part after Taxi Driver and The King of Comedy, which meant the story had a template to fall back on. It had a beginning, middle and a clear ending. This Joker sequel had no template to follow. It’s similar to how the first Wonder Woman movie (2017) adapted George Perez’s 1987 seminal comic book run on the character as well as taking inspirations from the 2009 animated movie and Captain America: The First Avenger. But when the filmmakers were given free rein for Wonder Woman 1984 with no established story to copy, the result was a disaster.
Set two years after the first film, Joker: Folie a Deux starts off with Arthur Fleck wallowing in Arkham State Hospital. He gets a spark in his life when he meets Harleen “Lee” Quinzel (Lady Gaga), an obsessed fan of the Joker, and the two form a romantic relationship. Arthur finds a new way to express himself through singing and fantasizing musical scenarios to convey his emotions. But his newfound happiness might be short-lived as Arthur goes to trial facing the death penalty.
Phoenix once again gives a magnificent performance. His physical and emotional transformation of the character is just astounding. The film is a character study of Arthur Fleck and dives further into his psyche, which at times felt derivative especially at the trial scenes since a lot of the aspects were already tackled in the first film.
Lady Gaga’s acting was good and her singing was even better but she was not properly utilized as her version of Harley Quinn lacked a little depth and a few scenes to flesh out the character. There are a few set photos and footage of Harley that were in promotions that didn’t make the final cut of the film, suggesting Harley had a lot more scenes.
The rest of the supporting cast was solid which included Brendan Gleeson as an abusive guard at Arkham, Catherine Keener as Arthur’s lawyer, Steve Coogan as a TV journalist and Leigh Gill as Arthur’s former co-worker. The one cast that really didn’t work was Harry Lawtey as Harvey Dent. They chose an actor that looked very young to play Dent in an attempt to align his age with the young Bruce Wayne in case there’s more sequels to this Elseworld universe.
I have a suspicion that Todd Phillips didn’t like that Arthur Fleck was inadvertently glamorized and idolized in real life. It feels like Phillips made the sequel to tear down the character, to humanize him further without sensationalizing it, to show the harsh consequences of his actions. I’ll post more in the spoiler box below on why it felt like Arthur Fleck was intentionally knocked down several pegs. I didn’t like the ending which I will also address in the spoiler box.
Another problem with the film is the musical aspect. I understand it’s a way for Arthur to express himself and to show his fantasies in a musical format but it just didn’t work in so many ways. At first, the singing was tolerable but it just would incessantly pop up all throughout the film that it became annoying. I don’t mind musicals but Folie a Deux’s musical are not original songs and just covers that aren’t even well done despite Gaga’s fantastic vocals. These musical moments also disrupt the flow of the film and the film would have been better if they took them out.
Lee tells Arthur at one point in the film, “Let’s give the people what they want.” If only Todd Phillips applied this to his script as well instead of doing the exact opposite of what the fans wanted.
PRELIMINARY RATING: 5.5/10
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Dragonlord’s Review of JOKER: FOLIE A DEUX (No Spoilers)
Bottom Line: Despite another stellar performance by Joaquin Phoenix, some beautiful cinematography and imagery, Joker: Folie a Deux bombs due to the thin plot with little to no payoff and a quasi-musical experiment that felt flat and intrusive.
Joker (2019) was originally planned as a standalone movie with no sequels. After the film became a smash hit, reaching $1 billion worldwide, Warner Bros. offered a ton of money to writer-director Todd Phillips and star Joaquin Phoenix to come back. Unfortunately, Phillips didn’t really have a good vision for the sequel. He only had concepts of a plan.
One of the major problems with Joker: Folie a Deux was that it felt like Phillips didn’t really have a good story to tell for the sequel. The first Joker movie was modeled for the most part after Taxi Driver and The King of Comedy, which meant the story had a template to fall back on. It had a beginning, middle and a clear ending. This Joker sequel had no template to follow. It’s similar to how the first Wonder Woman movie (2017) adapted George Perez’s 1987 seminal comic book run on the character as well as taking inspirations from the 2009 animated movie and Captain America: The First Avenger. But when the filmmakers were given free rein for Wonder Woman 1984 with no established story to copy, the result was a disaster.
Set two years after the first film, Joker: Folie a Deux starts off with Arthur Fleck wallowing in Arkham State Hospital. He gets a spark in his life when he meets Harleen “Lee” Quinzel (Lady Gaga), an obsessed fan of the Joker, and the two form a romantic relationship. Arthur finds a new way to express himself through singing and fantasizing musical scenarios to convey his emotions. But his newfound happiness might be short-lived as Arthur goes to trial facing the death penalty.
Phoenix once again gives a magnificent performance. His physical and emotional transformation of the character is just astounding. The film is a character study of Arthur Fleck and dives further into his psyche, which at times felt derivative especially at the trial scenes since a lot of the aspects were already tackled in the first film.
Lady Gaga’s acting was good and her singing was even better but she was not properly utilized as her version of Harley Quinn lacked a little depth and a few scenes to flesh out the character. There are a few set photos and footage of Harley that were in promotions that didn’t make the final cut of the film, suggesting Harley had a lot more scenes.
The rest of the supporting cast was solid which included Brendan Gleeson as an abusive guard at Arkham, Catherine Keener as Arthur’s lawyer, Steve Coogan as a TV journalist and Leigh Gill as Arthur’s former co-worker. The one cast that really didn’t work was Harry Lawtey as Harvey Dent. They chose an actor that looked very young to play Dent in an attempt to align his age with the young Bruce Wayne in case there’s more sequels to this Elseworld universe.
I have a suspicion that Todd Phillips didn’t like that Arthur Fleck was inadvertently glamorized and idolized in real life. It feels like Phillips made the sequel to tear down the character, to humanize him further without sensationalizing it, to show the harsh consequences of his actions. I’ll post more in the spoiler box below on why it felt like Arthur Fleck was intentionally knocked down several pegs. I didn’t like the ending which I will also address in the spoiler box.
Another problem with the film is the musical aspect. I understand it’s a way for Arthur to express himself and to show his fantasies in a musical format but it just didn’t work in so many ways. At first, the singing was tolerable but it just would incessantly pop up all throughout the film that it became annoying. I don’t mind musicals but Folie a Deux’s musical are not original songs and just covers that aren’t even well done despite Gaga’s fantastic vocals. These musical moments also disrupt the flow of the film and the film would have been better if they took them out.
Lee tells Arthur at one point in the film, “Let’s give the people what they want.” If only Todd Phillips applied this to his script as well instead of doing the exact opposite of what the fans wanted.
PRELIMINARY RATING: 5.5/10
Expounding on my opinion that writer-director Todd Phillips intentionally dismantled Arthur Fleck. He is rejected by Lee at the end, mirroring real life situations where sometimes spurned people grow to hate the opposite sex or society in general. Arthur goes back to Arkham and unceremoniously shivved to death. He doesn’t even get to exact retribution on his Arkham tormenters, which I didn’t mind though as it avoided the standard revenge trope.
As for the ending where Arthur’s killer uses a blade to carve his own mouth, similar to Heath Ledger’s Joker, I don’t like it because it devalues Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker as some sort Joker beta version. I’m fine with Phoenix’s Joker not being the notorious clown prince of crime since this is a different universe. But the filmmakers (and studio?) are trying so hard to force the stereotypical Joker into this Elseworld universe and thereby potentially setting up a Batman-Joker thing in the far future. This reminds me of the Gotham TV series where they introduce their version of Joker, only to be revealed later on that this is not THE Joker and is just a precursor to the real Joker in the future. It feels cheap.
As for the ending where Arthur’s killer uses a blade to carve his own mouth, similar to Heath Ledger’s Joker, I don’t like it because it devalues Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker as some sort Joker beta version. I’m fine with Phoenix’s Joker not being the notorious clown prince of crime since this is a different universe. But the filmmakers (and studio?) are trying so hard to force the stereotypical Joker into this Elseworld universe and thereby potentially setting up a Batman-Joker thing in the far future. This reminds me of the Gotham TV series where they introduce their version of Joker, only to be revealed later on that this is not THE Joker and is just a precursor to the real Joker in the future. It feels cheap.
Please leave a Like if you appreciate my reviews. Thanks.
