JOKER: FOLIE À DEUX - Mark Reviews Movies

Joker: Folie a Deux, Warner Bros. Pictures

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Review by Mark Dujsik | October 3, 2024

Joker: Folie à Deux likely isn't the sequel anyone would expect to returning co-writer/director Todd Phillips' grounded tale of the origin story of the comics' most famous villain. For one thing, this follow-up is partly a courtroom drama, picking apart the protagonist and his supposed madness, while also nudging anyone who somehow might have mistaken the first film's depiction of the guy as an endorsement of him. It's strange that Phillips and also-returning co-screenwriter Scott Silver feel the need to do this, but since Joker did become an unlikely flashpoint in a cultural discussion about a lot more than the film actually offered, one can sympathize with the desire to set the record straight.

For another and even more surprising thing, the continuation of the story of Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix), the self-appointed "Joker," is also a musical. There's a good reason for it, since Arthur latches on to a fellow, musically inclined patient in the asylum where he's currently awaiting trial. In order to express his feelings and imagine a world in which he's as big a deal as he desperately wants to be, Arthur sings and dances in fantasy sequences that intentionally feel wrong.

That's not only because of what happens in some of them or the sudden restoration of reality. It's also because the musical accompaniment to the assorted showtunes and pop songs is often dissonant—in the wrong key or out of rhythm. The approach stays in line with Phillips' first priority here. Even if someone wanted to enjoy a musical about a clown of a man who became a murderous clown, the movie denies that possibility. Arthur is no hero, and by the end of his story, Phillips and Silver fully deny him the status of anti-hero or even villain.

The movie is daring, then, not only in terms of its methods, but also in its narrative, which feels like a complete rebuke of its main character and his delusions of grandeur. The first film accomplished that well enough, while also offering a subversive take on a comic-book story planted firmly in a sense of hopeless reality. This one's subversive on a different level—multiple ones, really. It's admirable, for sure, but also a messy argument for a redundant thesis.

When we last left Arthur, he was locked up in Arkham Asylum, having killed six people—including one murder happening live on national television. He's still there a couple years later, heavily medicated, looking entirely gaunt on the outside and hollow on the inside, and telling jokes to guards in exchange for cigarettes.

Two things offer a momentary spark of life. The first is seeing Lee Quinzel (Lady Gaga) in passing on a walk to meet with his attorney. She's in the minimum-security wing of the institution, singing as part of group therapy, and Arthur smiles for the first time when Lee makes it clear that she knows him and his reputation.

The second thing is when Arthur's attorney (played by Catherine Keener) puts her client in front of a camera to record his testimony for a hearing to determine if he's mentally competent to stand trial. The guy loves attention, which he proves again in a pre-trial interview with a reporter (played by Steve Coogan) and repeatedly in the courtroom, where television cameras broadcast the trial live.

The rest of the plot isn't much of one, because the filmmakers have so much else on their minds. It's a love story of sorts, as Arthur and Lee bond over music, plans to start a life together whenever he's free, and, mostly, her obsession with, not Arthur, but Joker. Is Joker another persona in Arthur's fragmented mind, or is Arthur simply a malignant narcissist who committed those murders in full awareness of his actions and, eventually, to be noticed?

That's the legal case being argued, with Arthur's lawyer on one side and a young Gotham City prosecutor named Harvey Dent (Harry Lawtey) on the other. In the courtroom, a psychiatrist (played by Ken Leung) makes a compelling case that Arthur is Arthur and no one else. Later, Dent calls in witnesses to Arthur's crimes—such as Gary (Leigh Gill), who saw one particularly brutal killing and whom Arthur spared—or to accounts of his behavior—such as Sophie (Zazie Beetz), who was the target of Arthur's obsession and regrets not saying anything before his fatal appearance on a late-night talk show. She had to go into hiding because of Arthur's rabid fans and detractors hounding her for information or blame.

Theoretically, all of this works as a continuation and expansion of the character study of the first film, with more direct condemnations and analysis of Arthur's behavior and personality. Narratively, though, it is a jumble of conceits, gimmicks, and, in the third act, some jarring action that's over-the-top and thematically superfluous enough to make us wonder if it's another fantasy. The musical numbers, by the way, are stylistically intriguing, but while a couple instances make the point of them apparent, Phillips gives us so many that their intentionally deflating effect does, well, deflate their impact.

This is an unexpectedly bold experiment of a movie, and for that, Joker: Folie à Deux deserves some credit. That it might be too elaborate for its own good doesn't fully defeat the movie's purpose, especially a final punch line making it clear that Arthur was the joke all along.