Joker and the 2012 Ridley Scott film Prometheus are essentially the same film. Stay with me. Both films are near unanimously celebrated for confident cinematography, genre bending creative ambition, strong leads, and an underlying narrative adding up to more than the individual parts. Both pass the eye test - you look at the screen and know it’s good. Very, very good. Phoenix is on screen for nearly all of the films 122-minute run time and his performance is just as transfixing in the final reel as minute one. That there are many who regard Phoenix’s Joker as anywhere near Ledger’s in The Dark Knight tells you all you need to know. With Ledger and Phoenix both receiving well-deserved Oscar nods, I feel for the next person to slather on the Joker war paint. Jared Leto’s Suicide Squad clown prince performance isn’t on the same artistic plane. In Leto’s defense, he’s clearly going for a less realistic and more off-the-comic-panel Joker rendition. Getting back to the relationship between Joker and Prometheus, both films pose and ponder existential questions about the human condition and how we assign meaning to our lives. Both do so in a captivating style that is interesting and compelling. But neither film answers the questions presented. Neither film cares about answers, only entertainment. They leave it up to us to interpret, debate and argue. I wouldn’t have it any other way. Rumor has it we are getting a Joker 2. I’ll show up for it but part of me wants Joker to exist as a standalone film. Once we get our answers, the debate stops.
Joker receives a score of 9/10 for general audiences and a 9.5/10 for fans of the most compelling and enduring comic book villain ever. The film is in some respects unnecessarily ambiguous, but that’s part of the allure.
The Quick Critic
Copyright © 2024 The Quick Critic - All Rights Reserved.
Powered by GoDaddy Website Builder
We use cookies to analyze website traffic and optimize your website experience. By accepting our use of cookies, your data will be aggregated with all other user data.