Send in the gore, Bickle goes operatic.

Rating: 4/10 (9 October 2019)

You have to be patient with Todd Phillip's Joker before he delivers the requisite gore fest this god of sadistic comedy requires. It is carried along most of the way by the outstanding performance of Joaquin Phoenix and a lax system and gullible society unable to put the obvious together that allows the morose Arthur Fleck to wreak havoc in plain sight.
Nothing could live up to the film's hype and outside of Phoenix's stirring but admittedly overlong performance ( a little too many yoga poses) the film depends heavily on nostalgia (music, era, Scosese) to propel its meagre satiric moments. As far as the character, Peck is classic cliche loner, Travis Bickle as Paglacci hanging around his old haunts.
Like all hateful Jokers, Arthur is imbued with the ability to take an incredible beating as he does here before rising from the ashes in Todd's apocalyptic uptown climax that is more nonsensical than parable.
Featuring a performance for the ages Joker ultimately is a smug gratuitously violent slasher, its unintentionally comic moments watching the heavy handed Phillips maintain PC order amid all the chaos.