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thedailyfootinass t1_ja9mq82 wrote

Reply to comment by GTOdriver04 in How Martin Scorsese's 'The King of Comedy' Predicted the Future, 40 Years On by MsWrite

A tad off-topic, but I feel like Joker was essentially Taxi Driver and KoC. I saw the film and didn’t get anything new from it aside from wrapping it in comic book characters.

I agree with KoC. I was really turned off by his acting at first but I agree that it was good.

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i-got-a-jar-of-rum t1_jaayn3y wrote

That’s essentially what it is and I feel like I'm in the minority when I say Joker wasn’t all that good. It got the two Oscars it most deserved but beyond that it’s not that compelling. It is an aesthetic copy of Scorsese thrillers with a shiny comic book movie cover and an overly-edgy fanbase whose only prior knowledge of the Joker character comes from Heath Ledger’s performance in The Dark Knight, and then they think the character is “deep” and “meaningful” in ways that comics and movies don’t even portray him.

Also people like to praise this film for its writing but people forget like half the movie is this weird amateur detective subplot that accomplishes nothing other than comic book nods to characters like Bruce Wayne and Alfred and locations like Arkham Asylum.

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KiIgore-Trout t1_jab628v wrote

Not to nitpick, but The Killing Joke was 1988, so that dark gritty tragic joker has been around for 35 years at least in comics

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i-got-a-jar-of-rum t1_jab83t7 wrote

I won’t deny the impact that has had on the character’s depiction in the years since, including Ledger and Phoenix, but in this case it feels like an “over-representation” of the character, that he is and has always been this tragic figure trying to prove a point, rather than an elemental force of chaos that destroys because it amuses him. Besides, the Joker as portrayed by Phoenix is vastly different to the one in Killing Joke, where Arthur was always troubled and mentally disturbed even before he killed anyone, whereas in the graphic novel the character starts out as sane but massively depressed about life.

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Jedi_Council_Worker t1_jab8spt wrote

The performance of Joaquin Phoenix as well as the score and cinematography are the only compelling parts of Joker. It's tackling of mental health was so on the nose and lacked substance. I honestly hate the way edge lords look to the Joker character as a poster boy for mental illness.

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