Solid 4 // The only superhero movie I've enjoyed in a decade

Rating: 8/10 (12 October 2019)

As an ardent decrier of all things superhero, this movie won me over. It manages to avoid almost all of the things that usually turn me off about the genre - the formulaic, committee-think constructions, the overwhelming test-screened safeness, the crowd appeasement, the vanilla-flavored tone. Instead, Joker establishes an absorbing atmosphere, one that was surprisingly nihilistic, grimy, and even genuinely unsettling. This is probably the closest a superhero franchise movie is ever going to come to an art-house style character study and it's pulled off quite convincingly. It isn't exactly subtle, and there are some hamfisted moments (the totally unnecessary flashbacks regarding the love interest jump to mind), but as a portrayal of a deeply disturbed individual cast off and exploited, the movie was able to generate real empathy and disgust. Much of the success is, of course, owed to the excellence of Joaquin Phoenix's performance which elevates the material. I was pleasantly surprised by how compromised and pitiful his character was written to be. Rather than rise up by some grand anarchist scheme, his notoriety happens almost entirely incidentally while his own actions are fueled by apolitical and often delusional motivations. The entire third act of the film could be viewed as a wish-fulfillment psychosis as the underbelly of the city rises fantastically around him, offering him the stage he's always dreamed of commanding. While likely either a flashback or a flashforward, the final scene also seems to subtly reinforce this suggestion of psychosis and adds a nice sprinkle of ambiguity. Even if you're a superhero skeptic, give this one a shot.
Solid 4/5