Joker (2019)

I really wanted to like this movie. The trailers weren't that great, which I know in general aren't a definitive indicator of how good or bad a movie will end up being, but in my case, I'm usually good at predicting how much I will enjoy a movie based on its trailers.

First things first, Joaquin Phoenix does a wonderful job in the lead role, and he deserved the Best Actor Oscar he was awarded for it. That being said, the story surrounding him and the other characters in the film just aren't that interesting, and much of the plot is extremely derivative of earlier Scorsese films. One of the things that made Heath Ledger's Joker such an engrossing character was the mystery behind his motivations. We knew nothing about his past, and what he did reveal about himself to other characters would be contradicted by something else he would tell another character later in the film.

The sequence of events that lead to the Joker in this film becoming famous are completely contrived. If the movie was set in the modern day, the idea of a standup comedian bombing on open mic night being filmed and going viral and leading to an appearance on a popular late night talk show would be believable, but given the movie's early 1980's setting, I didn't buy it.

The fact that they also decided to shoehorn in the murder of Bruce Wayne's parents had me rolling my eyes. Just how often do they think moviegoers need to see the crux of Batman's origin?

I even gave this movie a second chance a little more than a year after originally seeing it, and I ended up liking the film even less. I would give it 2.5/5. I'll be generous and round it up here to 3/5 for Phoenix's performance, as well as for the film introducing me to the Jackson C. Frank song "My Name Is Carnival."

Phaneron ★

A unique alternative origin for the iconic villain, "Joker" is by and large a success. With a delightfully dreary palette and an Oscar-worthy performance from Joaquin Phoenix, it is a fine film and well worth seeing. Though it does occasionally suffer from a predictable narrative and underwritten secondary roles, when it works... it works darned well. And it easily earns a very good 4 out of 5.

TedStixon

I saw this movie in theaters with my girlfriend.


Fantastic movie. This is a good turn for DC, and I hope they learn the right lessons from this and keep making films that are of this quality.

There's not much I can really say about the film, but it's acted well, written well, and executed great.
Following the origin story, or one possible origin story, of the Joker. Or what I actually believe is the person who inspires the real Joker.

Borrowing heavily from films from the 70's, like King of Comedy and Taxi Driver, this movie sets a dark tone that DC seems to love. However it doesn't drown itself in the darkness, and does it a good balance for this character.
It also has that freedom of not being tied to or trying to connect to multi movie stories or a universe. It's self contained and it's own thing, which is where DC movies like the animated ones tend to really thrive with.
I hope this inspires DC to make more live action stand alone tales like this and stop trying to play cheep catch up to Marvel, which they will never get to at this point.
(looking at you Justice League)

This a great movie, and I would give it 4 1/2 stars if the ratings would let me. I did have a couple of issues with the movie, but nothing to make it bad or not worth at least 4 stars.

Mistake Status: Didn't really catch any in the theaters. I do love comic book hero movies (or in this case, villain movies) and will for sure get my hands on this and comb through it more in the future.

Quantom X ★