"Joker" (Spoilers!)

[CliffHanger2]

What's funny is while Todd Phillips claimed that he wasn't trying to make a comic accurate movie, he ultimately did as Joker's origin is and has always been a mystery. By us not knowing what was real and what wasn't, the film in all reality may have been one of Joker's many made up stories that he has always told. Remember in TDK where joker told like 3 different stories on how he got his scars. The movie as a whole could be a single version of all the different stories that he has concocted in his mind, which imo is the best joker origin film because we came out of the film still not knowing the origin.

Except the movie clearly showed us when he was hallucinating and when he wasn't. So not sure why ppl are saying this. We saw thru flashbacks his relationship with beetz was fantasy and his first appearance on the murray show was a daydream.

[CliffHanger2]

"What do you get when you cross a mentally ill loner? What you deserve!" I can see why there are concerns about this movie after watching it. 2 murders may have possibly taken place offscreen. Even though he's sporting Cardi B shoes at the end it's not definite he killed the psychiatrist. But it does paint ppl who commit crimes like this in a very sympathetic light.

[Slowpokeking]

Why didn't they actually make Arthur the son of Thomas at the same time keep those abuse. Won't it make the character more sympathetic and closer to The Man Who Laughs?

[Jim Kelly]

It bothers me that some reviews I've seen say that this is a cynical movie. And moreover, they try to figure out what the director himself personally thinks about the real world based on the art that he has made.

Maybe I'm the cynical one, because I don't see this movie as cynical. It's simply that an artist makes these decisions about how to present a subject. And it's an artistic choice to leave any mediating perspective out of the work--so you just get a raw view of the world from a specific character perspective. But just because that's Joker's view--it doesn't mean it's the director's.

And it shouldn't really be the job of a critic to figure out what's in the mind of the director--the job is to figure what the movie does and how it does that. Otherwise reviewers could just interview the director, never see the movie, write down what the director tells them is the point of the movie and present that as their review. Reviewing art is reviewing art not doing psychoanalysis on the artist.

There are lots of directors who were evil people in real life, but they made movies that had a sunny outlook and presented the world as nice. It's entirely possible for a director to be a compassionate human being yet decide to leave that compassion out of his movie for artistic purposes.

There are movies like Fellini's LA STRADA, Scorsese's TAXI DRIVER, Kubrick's THE SHINING, Lanthimos's THE KILLING OF A SACRED DEER that are unrelenting in their bleak outlook, that could be seen as cynical--simply because the director doesn't give you an alternate perspective in the movie that you can escape through, to get away from the oppressive world that it presents. But I don't assume those movies are cynical or that the directors are cynical.

[ComicJunkie21]

Except the movie clearly showed us when he was hallucinating and when he wasn't. So not sure why ppl are saying this. We saw thru flashbacks his relationship with beetz was fantasy and his first appearance on the murray show was a daydream.

One of the good things about this film is that it can be interpreted in many different ways. One interpretation is taking the film simply how its presented to us and assuming that only the pieces where there are flashbacks are the only fabrications in the story. Another interpretation is viewing the fabrications that we do see as hints or indications that the perspective that we are being shown from Arthur's view should be questioned as he is not a reliable narrator of events.

There is evidence to support either view. Personally I support the latter and view the entire film as being a fabrication created by Arthur who like Joker in the comics changes his origin story quite frequently due to his genuine insanity and/or because he actually doesn't recall it.

[Lightning Rider]

I think it's valid to believe that there's a possibility much of the film is either fantasy or delusion, but the fact that it was explicit in two instances and the rest of the movie was portrayed without ambiguity makes me feel like they could have done a better job if they wanted fans to mistrust Arthur's point of view throughout.

[kingaliencracker]

I feel the movie was one of the most interesting movies I've seen in quite some time.

My preconceived notions I had prior to seeing the movie were more or less affirmed, however. This is was an attempt to make Joker redeemable or sympathetic, and I just don't feel that fits the character. This is a movie that could have been told without the "Joker" title. And Joker without Batman doesn't work nearly as well as Joker with Batman.

But it was very well acted, and I enjoyed the ambiguity of it all.

[Jim Kelly]

I don't think there was any attempt to make Joker redeemable or sympathetic. The movie starts out with a sympathetic character, but that's to draw us into the story, so we will follow his arc. Halfway through the movie I abandoned all hope of any redemption or any sympathy. I feel bad for the character, sure--but once he commits his horrific acts, there's no hope for him. He's a lost soul.

It's a fine distinction, because there were many times I was in awe of the performance. I like Thomas Hardy's dark, disturbing novels and there's something about the representation of a horrifying image that is satisfying on an aesthetic level. The meaning isn't morally good, but the artistic achievement in making that image is good. You can like a great work of horror cinema and still not be in favour of murder.

Just because I admire JOKER the movie that doesn't mean I'm a fan of psychotic killers.

[numberthirty]

I don't think there was any attempt to make Joker redeemable or sympathetic. The movie starts out with a sympathetic character, but that's to draw us into the story, so we will follow his arc. Halfway through the movie I abandoned all hope of any redemption or any sympathy. I feel bad for the character, sure--but once he commits his horrific acts, there's no hope for him. He's a lost soul.

It's a fine distinction, because there were many times I was in awe of the performance. I like Thomas Hardy's dark, disturbing novels and there's something about the representation of a horrifying image that is satisfying on an aesthetic level. The meaning isn't morally good, but the artistic achievement in making that image is good. You can like a great work of horror cinema and still not be in favour of murder.

Just because I admire JOKER the movie that doesn't mean I'm a fan of psychotic killers.

There is a film called I Saw The Devil where a government agent's wife is murdered by a serial killer and he sets out for revenge. While he is a sympathetic character when the film starts, he is so far across the line and has done so much no matter what the collateral damage was that there is no redeeming him past a certain point in the film.

This film sort of felt like that to me. While you have reason to sympathize, there's no way to truly be sympathetic by the end.

[scary harpy]

I saw Joker last night.

Wow.

I have never liked Joker as a villain. This movie was powerful.

It was painful watching the humiliation and degradation that Art Fleck endured. The cluttered, dirty, uncaring city of Gotham was appropriate on many levels.

I didn't care when he shot those guys on the subway. I don't know what other choice Art had. He did not seem to have any good choices.

I knew he was going to shot the TV Host; I felt Art talked too long before he killed Murray.

I wanted more comic book violence at the end. I guess I was expecting him to become the Joker from the comics in the conclusion.

[Slowpokeking]

I want to know 2 things clear.

Did Penny really have an affair with Thomas?

If so, did it cause her mental illness?

[Fairyprincess]

I think the scene with Tomas Wayne was real.. but were meant to think it isn't. Because it seem inspired by the shining.

In the shining Jack Nicholson (who also played the joker. ) as a conversation with possible imaginary people twice. Once in a bathroom. Once in a gold room.

Arthur speaks to Thomas in a gold Barth room. I think that is done as a reference to make you think that's not real, when really it is....

[Jim Kelly]

I thought it was odd that the Waynes didn't take Bruce to a Charlie Chaplin movie, yet they did take him to a George Hamilton movie. But I guess if Bruce had been at MODERN TIMES it would have set up audience expectations that don't fit with the plot.

[kingaliencracker]

I don't think there was any attempt to make Joker redeemable or sympathetic. The movie starts out with a sympathetic character, but that's to draw us into the story, so we will follow his arc. Halfway through the movie I abandoned all hope of any redemption or any sympathy. I feel bad for the character, sure--but once he commits his horrific acts, there's no hope for him. He's a lost soul.

It's a fine distinction, because there were many times I was in awe of the performance. I like Thomas Hardy's dark, disturbing novels and there's something about the representation of a horrifying image that is satisfying on an aesthetic level. The meaning isn't morally good, but the artistic achievement in making that image is good. You can like a great work of horror cinema and still not be in favour of murder.

Just because I admire JOKER the movie that doesn't mean I'm a fan of psychotic killers.

There most definitely was an attempt to make Joker sympathetic. Redeemable? I think that's more debatable. But he lost his medication due to budget cuts, which in turn led to his regressing mental health state. The people he attacked or murdered were less-than desirable people. And his mother allowed him to be horrifically abused as a child.

Now, again because of the ambiguity that the movie leaves us with, we can take the events that we saw with a grain of salt. But at face value, there was most definitely an attempt to make him AT LEAST sympathetic.

[Lightning Rider]

There is a film called I Saw The Devil where a government agent's wife is murdered by a serial killer and he sets out for revenge. While he is a sympathetic character when the film starts, he is so far across the line and has done so much no matter what the collateral damage was that there is no redeeming him past a certain point in the film.

This film sort of felt like that to me. While you have reason to sympathize, there's no way to truly be sympathetic by the end.

See, I didn't feel this, because as I said earlier, almost everyone killed had wronged him in some way. There's no true blue innocent victim in his film to make us abhor him. Which isn't to say we cheered every death, but we didn't truly mourn anyone.

Michael Moore just released a statement saying that the film makes you root for him, and he sees it as a positive since he's a product of a failing system. For me it sells the character short and makes his evolution incomplete.