Images courtesy of Warner Brothers |
When Joker came out in 2019, it was surrounded by controversy due to the intense violence and the character's perceived idolization. For some critics, his character felt a little too close to home, and the muddy script and mixed messaging didn't help matters. However, Joaquin Phoenix's performance transcended these criticisms and even netted him his first Oscar win. Despite the heated discourse, Joker was a colossal hit financially, and questions swirled around the idea of a sequel. Todd Phillips didn't want to make the expected sequel, with Joker terrorizing Gotham City; instead, he focused on further deconstruction of the character itself. There's one catch, though: it's a musical. It might be more accurate to describe this film as "musical-adjacent" because it purposefully isn't structured like one; it flirts with the notion, literally and figuratively tap-dancing around the concept.
After the events of the first film, Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix) is rotting his life away in Arkham Asylum, waiting to see if he will be declared mentally competent for trial. His surroundings are grey and depressing, and the guards take delight in harassing him mentally and physically. On the outside, he still represents chaos, and a TV movie has sensationalized his case even further. The Joker persona is a distant memory to him, only popping up occasionally in his fantasies. Arkham has a few bright spots, specifically a weekly choir group. After attending a session, Arthur meets Harleen Quinn (Lady Gaga), a troubled young woman who is a big fan of the Joker. They initiate a whirlwind romance that threatens to engulf them both in flames.
Joker: Folie à Deux (2024) has three central narrative ideas: the romance brewing between Arthur and Harleen, the musical aspect, and a courtroom drama. Any one of these ideas could have made for an intriguing film, but because Phillips decided to tackle all three, none of them are fleshed out enough.
The romance angle starts intriguing, as it’s a subversive of the usual dynamic from previous depictions. Usually, Joker is the abuser, and Harley is the victim, but in this case, she has the upper hand emotionally. Arthur still has an immature, romanticized outlook on personal relationships, and he is easy fodder to be manipulated. Sadly, Lady Gaga isn’t given enough to do with her character, and she ends up more as background noise for Arthur’s development and arc, which ultimately feels shallow and unsatisfying.
On the musical side, someone had the bright idea, “What if we made a grounded musical that’s not really a musical”! The transitions between the regular movie and the musical parts have no rhyme or reason. Usually, there is an agreement in musicals where nobody acknowledges that someone started singing and dancing out of nowhere. In this film, people sometimes notice Joker singing and are weirded out, and other times, they act like it didn’t happen. Some of it is obviously in Arthur’s head as he drifts into fantasy to escape his real life, but the film can’t decide whether the music is diegetic. Most of the songs are covers and, save a few exceptions, are staged and performed without much pizazz.
Once the narrative slides into the court procedural in the last act, it starts to get interesting, but again, the execution could be better. Not only is the character on trial, the entire concept of the Joker himself is being interrogated and deconstructed. Phillips is taking his frustrations over the controversy surrounding the first film out on the audience by not giving them the depiction of Joker they crave. At one point, Arthur muses: “I don’t think we are giving the audience what they want.”
Instead of witnessing a suave and chaotic Joker making a mockery of the justice system, we get a cringe-inducing comedy routine by a man who has only ever experienced confidence once in his entire life and only when he was taking someone else’s away. Arthur is a lame joke, a shell of a person hiding behind a mask, stripped bare for all to see. Although this is an amazing idea on paper, Phillips can’t help but continually call back to the stylized imagery of the first film, which somewhat undermines his thesis and ultimately rings hollow. Does he actually think Joker is a stupid concept? Furthermore, does he have contempt for the same audience who made the first film successful? I’m sure if he was asked, he would say with a sly grin, “You wouldn’t get it.”
—Michelle Kisner