Joker
Note: my rambling does have spoilers. Key word is ‘proceed or runaway’, so you are safe to read up to that point.
Before going in, I was also one of those obsessed people on YouTube that had no problem admitting to rewatching the trailers more than we should. What? It was mesmerizing, and worthy of a trailer award if there were any.
This is not a movie customized for comic fans, and I’m glad they took such approach. Even if you are not a comic person and couldn’t care less, you can still enjoy this movie, minus some parts where if you understand what these names like Wayne mean, you would dive deeper on the dark end of the message. Regardless, the movie expands beyond the DC character and leaps into our reality in a way that I (kind of) anticipated, but still did not expect to be so smooth, real, bold, and relatable.
My first thought when I watched the trailer for the first time was “Oh shit, they are making a relatable Joker?” No no no no no. That is the scariest monster you want to unleash. The world is already dark with enough problems.
But I guess not everyone will feel that way, and it’s true. After the movie ended, I heard 2 people behind my seats talking to one another “I don’t get it”.
Woah, am I that dark? Or old? Because they seem to be on the younger side. Maybe it has to do with how much life has beaten you down for you to get this movie or the character?
Come back to the point of ‘relatable Joker’, here is what I mean: we all know the Joker from all these Batman series before, across generations, all these Joker origin stories… from comics to movies… right? They all sounded comical to me (duh!), and I’m sure a lot of people think so too. A dude fell into a chemical pod and that was it?! Really? If that is how one turns to the dark, I bet we have an army of Jokers out in the streets by now given all the air pollution. So yeah, nothing relatable there, just a meaningless, gullible background story nobody bothered to think twice because it’s a comic story. And that is how Joker has been treated since the beginning of Batman movies, …
… until Heath Ledger & Nolan show up (and abolish the whole background concept altogether, to great effect)
Together, they created a much more horrifying, contemporary version of Joker. This Joker has a manifesto, he has a purpose, unique perspective (or is it?) – he is the puppeteer that spotlights societal hypocrisy at its best, and his job – which he loves – is to introduce anarchy, to send a message, to show it in broad day light, for all to see, or maybe just him & the Batman. It is so important for this Joker to push ‘the righteous’ over the edge, to prove their ‘true colors’.
Something about him still doesn’t make sense though – nobody knows who he is and surely the series wouldn’t bother going deep dive there either. “Do you know how I got these scars?” has been his own (self?) deceptive attempts to explain where he comes from, the moment that transform a ‘normal dude’ to a Joker. Perhaps the Joker himself doesn’t remember, but it doesn’t matter. It has NOT mattered for decades! Nobody bothers too much with how Joker becomes Joker because we like the enigma, we prefer to have a monster that we do not understand how and why it came to be. It is easier to be scared that way.
So, drumroll… fast forward to 2019, now we have a Joker origin story. Crazy?
This is not a singular attempt, actually Hollywood has other movie that introduce an empathetic view at a traditional villain already.
But this movie is not to make you empathize. Admittedly when I watched the trailer, that was my impression. ‘Oh making Joker relatable?’ The real world is complex and ideas are like virus. Humans are impressionable so who knows what this will unleash. So it’s understandable how USA has its police force prepared, and Aurora, and people expressing their concerns on violence in the movie… BEFORE watching the movie, mind you.
I wouldn’t go too much into details of the movie, but here are some afterthoughts – still it can be spoilery depends on your expectation of the movie – proceed or run away
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I was right to be cautious about the possibility that this is a mind-f***.
It is not in the sense of magician Inception style, it is more about humanity, society, how we are treating one another, the division, the poverty gap, the need to entertain base on ridiculing one another, the systematic ways that a society pushes a person over and over until somebody snaps, hypocrisy (a consistent theme with Heath’s Joker), mental illness is a serious topic in this one (so much to talk about), and… this is the worst of all, he was one of us, and we can (probably) see bits of himself in us. This is something we wouldn’t dare to say about Heath’s Joker. We might on many aspects agree with some of his statements, but it’s not the essence of who he is underneath that we see & understand. This is different.
So that is the major freakery that you will get from this movie.
With that said, do I (or general audience) now empathize/ sympathize/ condone Jokery actions?
This is where a lot of concerns stem from regarding this movie. But honestly after watching it, I don’t feel like that at all. I understand the transformation, it was very believable, heck it is too real that I got scared, and that is where this kicker comes in. The movie becomes a warning letter for all of us. ‘Hey, this can happen, this can happen to a real person out there‘, and then you start to think more about it and question your own role, our own role, as a society, in creating the ultimate Joker. This is no longer a comic character at this point, because the plot will get you there, this is realistic, relatable, and scary.
And, it’s also important to note that, despite whatever sympathy you feel for Arthur, Joaquin’s performance is soooo good that… despite it’s believable and convincing and you do feel bad for him, at some point you gasp at the transformation and realize… ‘no’ because there is a true line between empathy and condonation. There is this violence in him that I cannot see coming. The problem is you do understand his sentiments, but you still see a fundamental difference between that and going ‘hell yeah let’s shoot/kill him’. You won’t. So don’t worry about your moral collapse after watching Joker.
Side note: at the cinema I watched, before going in you will be offered a Joker stamp/tattoo on the hand. As suspicious as I was about what this whole thing mean (what is this a revolution? a movement? condoning what he stands for?!), I just said no thanks, which I’m glad I did after watching the movie.
Violence?
Yeah the movie does have violence, OF COURSE. It’s Joker! But it’s not that (*) gruesome. I had a stomachache from the stress of watching The Revenant. This movie’s level of violence is not THAT high, if you compare 2 movies of same serious tone. And if you compare this against Deadpool, Deadpool wins in terms of gruesome slow-mo and frequency, and dare I say even in glorifying-violence-territory. This movie does not, even though yes some scenes do portray Joker dancing after a kill, but it tells you more about his state of mind/mental illness than anything else. I got startled in my seat twice because how abrupt it is, and that is the key, because all in all there is underlying mental illness and so much anger that the character has built up inside, which you do empathize, but it still catches you off-guard!
(*): in Vietnam, some scenes were cut – I found out afterwards, so it did decrease the violent effect on audience mind. For me personally, well, I know cutting stuff out makes the experience not original anymore, but I cannot take too much realistic bloody inhumane scenes. I learned that from The Revenant. I could watch horror movies with the devil or ghost hanging up the ceiling and laugh, but when it comes to messed up psychological & physical violence combined, it is a thousand times scarier for me… so in a way I’m relieved to find out the details later.
So, what is it that I love about this movie?
Every single scene is thoughtfully created, the colors, the tone, the soundtracks (!!!) camera angles, the plot, the nuances, those stairs scenes (!!!) and the way Joaquin captures all these degrees of human emotions, and the transformation (i can ramble for days). Gosh I know he has it in him but still you have to watch it to see it and has your goosebumps moments. His dark energy has impressed me from Gladiator, so I had no doubt he would nail this portrayal on the ‘dark spectrum’. But little did I know that the plot and the buildup was so convincing, it didn’t feel forced one bit (which is what I was worrying about before watching the movie).
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So there, that is it. I appreciate the movie not because it’s entertaining, it makes me think and look back at myself, and I think it will open up lots of discussions. I think it is a heavy movie that you will still appreciate as a work of art many years later, the same way people are still talking about Heath’s Joker today, but expands further because it doesn’t stop at one actor’s performance, it’s the theme and everything.
Heads up though, it is depressing, and will haunt your mind…”the destruction of a soul”… as someone elegantly put it on YouTube.
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