The Joker is Wild!

Rating: Null/10 (8 January 2020)

There are moments in "Joker" when the central character, Arthur "Happy" Fleck, reflects on how miserable he is. He acknowledges that "all I have are negative thoughts," and he consistently recognizes how the outside world is cruel, insensitive, and decaying from within, due the loss of a moral compass.
Is the bleak depiction of Gotham City, the world that Joker helps to destroy through anarchy, may lie one of the reasons why "Joker" earned over $1 billion in box office receipts: audiences have a direct, visceral reaction to the film's ugly environment. A central image in the film is the "super rats" that have infested Gotham City. The rats are enabled by another metaphor in the heaps of garbage that litter the streets. It is hard not to see a parallel with the current state of Los Angeles and San Francisco.
One of the most fascinating characters in the film is Thomas Wayne, the man who Arthur believes at one point was his long-lost father. Arthur sought out Mr. Wayne, hoping for a little compassion. For his efforts, Arthur received only more abuse and the knowledge that his mother was a pathological liar and had horribly abused him after she adopted him. Still, the film turns on the insensitive treatment of Arthur by Mr. Wayne, who thinks of him as nothing more than one of the blue collar workers he calls "clowns." In 2016, a former politician referred to the same crowd as "deplorables."
Another interesting character is the late-night television host and Arthur's idol, Murray Franklin. But any bond of trust between the two characters is destroyed when Franklin mocks Arthur's stand-up routine at Pogo's and invites him on the show to humiliate him even more. The film's best scene was Arthur's appearance on one of Franklin's programs. In the bonus track of the DVD, "Joker's" director, Todd Phillips, described how actor Joaquin Phoenix gave him a myriad number of different takes for Arthur's dynamic entrance on Franklin's show.
A shortcoming of Phoenix's performance was his interpretation of Arthur's laugh. The primary character trait of Arthur is the laugh, which works in counterpoint to his melancholy. But the laugh sounded like the actor's laugh, as opposed to coming out of the character's soul. The "laughing fits" should have been much more painful and disturbing for both Arthur and the characters around him.
While the musical score of "Joker" has received acclaim, the thundering, epic sounds and the protracted musical interludes added to the mood, but slowed down the pacing of the film. Phillips' direction was at its best in the excellent locations and the gritty style that recalled the underbelly of New York captured in "The French Connection." Both films are compelling works of cinema. But "The French Connection" is the one that will stand the test of time.