Music Banter - View Single Post - What's The Latest Film You Have Seen?
View Single Post
Old 10-15-2019, 09:37 AM   #23090 (permalink)
Exo
All day jazz and biscuits
 
Exo's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: NJ
Posts: 7,359
Default



Joker

Here's your review Bats. Actually, this perfect because I call you Bats just like Joker calls Batman, Bats. Weird huh?

Anyway, I saw this last night with my girlfriend. I don't get to go out to movies much. I've become a bit anti-people which would coincide with the theme of the film I'm about to talk about but really it's because I deal with them all f*cking day and after work I just wanna chill and be an indoor kid. My lady is okay with this and she likes to chill with me in my apartment but we gotta go date and sh*t every once in a while and it makes me happy to make her happy so we did a movie.

I usually try not to get into spoiler territory and while I won't discuss specific plot points, I'm going to talk about the tone and feel of Joker so if you don't like that, f*ck off now.

Heath Ledger's Joker was a one of a kind performance that launched into legendary status with his untimely death before the movie came out. It's untouchable and deserves to be so. However, this is NOT Ledger's joker. Ledger's joker was calculated. He was mysterious. He was almost a spectre in a sea of Nolan-esque comic book fantasy, showing up for a few chilling scenes and then hauling off somewhere like a ghost only to come back and scare the sh*t out of us again once Bruce was done trying to f*ck Maggie Gyllenhaal (I forget her characters name and honestly don't care to look it up. That's how much I did not give a f*ck).

Phoenix's Joker was, well, one of the best character studies I can remember watching in a long long time. In fact, I'd say the first 90 minutes of this film enters the territory of masterwork in how to tell a tragic story of the origin of a monster. Phoenix has been a favorite actor of mine since I saw him beat the sh*t out of some aliens with a baseball bat in Signs. Since then he's made some so-so films but then gave one of my favorite acting performances of all time in The Master and all of a sudden, hot sh*t, I'm a HUGE Joaquin Phoenix fan. I heard he was going to portray the Joker and all of a sudden I care about Batman again. I knew it would be calculated and breathtaking but I did not know it would be this heartbreaking. My heart BROKE for Arthur. That's good storytelling. That's good character development. That's good acting and I hope he gets awards for it. He was marvelous and it shows just how trans formative the man can be. His body transormation and his facial expressions was Joker, or at least what led to Joker.

I mentioned the first 90 minutes. The last 30 were very very good but it sort of crept back into being a comic book movie and while I am totally fine with that, it being a comic book origin movie and all, I was too engulfed in this film to make the switch back into Gotham stuff. I will say however that it didn't get too bad but there were some music choices and some scenes that seemed to be included only to appease the comic fans and it threw me off slightly. However the last 30 minutes were tense, beautifully shot, and again, wonderfully acted by Phoenix. It's less of a gripe and more of a turn that I was okay with but preferred the scenic route instead.

Todd Phillips made a wonderful movie. I REALLY hope this stands alone as the only Phoenix Joker film because it's almost perfect and I don't think they should ruin that. This was a character study of a descent into madness that was earned and never felt forced and if they force a sequel out of a perfect story, it'll be a damn shame.

9.5/10

Pretty much a perfect film. Loved it.
__________________
LastFM

SUPREME POO BAH MODERATOR EXTRAORDINAIRE
Exo is offline   Reply With Quote