Movie Review : Joker a Dark, Realistic Tale
Joaquin Phoenix as Arthur Fleck
In the City of Gotham, the rich get richer and the poorer become poorer. Arthur Fleck is a troubled clown that works to be a stand-up comedian, but never fulfills his dream. Played by Joaquin Phoenix, Arthur acts as a victim of life itself in the movie Joker directed by Todd Phillips.
Arthur Fleck, who is the main character in the film, is abused, beaten up, and made fun of. People see him as “the freak over there”. Arthur Fleck can’t operate in a society as broken as Gotham. What really separates him from everybody else is his uncontrollable laughter, which is one of his mental illnesses, often times his condition kicks in at the worst possible time. With no help from any type of system, Arthur stops taking his medication and the origin of the Joker begins.
Arthur Fleck is a version of Joker that nobody has seen before. Phillips said that the Film was based off the comic The Killing Joke, but certain characteristics of Arthur Fleck don’t relate to any previous Joker stories. That’s what separates this film from any other Joker story, the fact that Arthur acts in a very different way.
During the movie, Arthur gets made fun of, jumped, toyed with, and is generally misunderstood. Even though the film is about an the origin of a villain, the audience can get an empathetic feeling for the character because of what he goes through and the effect everything has on his mind and body. This element can relate to what is going on today in society with mental illness and how certain people have been brought up in negative environments and the toll it takes on their mind leading to mental illness.
This film can really open the eyes of people in our society today. Sometimes people don’t realize the effect their jokes, comments, remarks, have on people. Joker really shows you a worst-case scenario of this situation. There’s a man who has been made a fool his whole life, he has been trying to do what he wishes to do but his mental illness holds others back from accepting him into society. In the end, Arthur shows that he is unable to hold in his emotions, and begins to enact his dark, violent, and chaotic thoughts upon an unsuspecting Gotham.
Joker has already had a huge impact at the box office. As of November 5th, it has made over $930 million and will likely be the first R-rated film to gross an international total over $1 billion. Critically it has received mostly positive reviews. On RottenTomatoes, a site that aggregates worldwide reviews into one rating, Joker currently holds a 69% positive rating.
Overall, Joker is a new approach to the character of the Joker. Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker exists in a world that is closer to our own than the Gotham of previous Batman movies. The movie is definitely worth watching for not only fans of Batman, but also as a means to see the way our actions can affect others.