Joker Origin Story Announced

We're going to have to use this thread for it I think.

 

I thought it was a phenomenal piece of film making to be honest, I mean a lot of that is down to Phoenix obviously, I just couldn't take my eyes off the screen, but the way the film's structured...I mean the way that huge set of stairs factors into the storyline alone was fantastic IMO.

Don't get the incel controversy, to be honest of the films I've seen this year I find Rambo and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood more problematic. The kind of person who'd go nuts in real life might be more like Arthur Fleck in reality, but they won't see themselves as Arthur Fleck, they'll see themselves more as John Rambo or Cliff Booth. Imo obviously

 

Athur had many problems, and although he fantasized about his neighbour (and may well have done something horrible to her at the end, the movie cuts from her begging him to leave to him outside), sexual frustration didn't seem to be near the top of his list or an instigating factor in his eventual actions.

Therefore, not incel. Their whole pathetic lives revolve around not getting laid.

 

Yup. What bothers me more is that they seemed to be wishing for it to happen.

 

This discussion is so weird... The media only picked up on this when theater chains were warned by the military of increased chatter on the incel boards. There was deemed to be a high probability of attack - the media didn't make that up...

 

This is the perfect movie for World Mental Health day. Arthur wanted help and tried to get it but was badly let down by a broken system. That's what makes it so sad. He'd never have been "happy", but I think he could have been much closer to "content" if the system were as willing or capable as he.

 

The movie also showed that the system wasn't helping much. "You aren't listening to me." It probably would have prevented him from being a mass murderer though.

 

https://www.vulture.com/article/best-dc-comics-movies.html

In this list Joker is 8th out of 32, a placement I don't have an issue with. I completely disagree with the writeup though.

I didn't see it that way at all. The brutality was almost shown to be inevitable. A modern day "eat the rich" is the far less satirical and thus scarily realistic "kill the rich". To me, the movie showed the brutal riots with glee.

Did they watch a different movie than me? Joker was absolutely presented as an anti-hero, not a villain.

Spoiler

The wall street types he took out? Despicable people. The fat clown? He is the one who started this by giving a gun to a mentally ill fella. His mom? He believed that she had abused him at the time. The talk show host? He was full of himself and was making fun of Arthur. Any time the movie could have shown Joker doing TRULY despicable things, it shied away. The little man? Spared. His neighbor? Who knows, but camera cut away. Dcotor in the hospital? Cut away.

Any time Joker killed someone who "deserved it" it was shown. Any time he killed an innocent it was either only implied, or at least not shown.

Spoiler

REALLY??? Thomas was shown to be a complete asshole here, who staged Arthur's abuse to cover up his affair (or maybe he didn't). His comments sparked the riots as much as Joker did (probably more). He was at best out of touch and at worst one of the most despicable people ever shown in the Batman universe. Were we supposed to feel bad about his murder??

On the same site, I did find a take I do completely agree with.

https://www.vulture.com/2019/10/joker-is-a-movie-with-deliberately-contradictory-politics.html

EDIT: Completely agree with the take on Joker. The take on Goetz is... not accurate.

 

BTW the incel connection came from this:

 

No, but they did make up some pretty hateful screeds. See, for example, this review decrying the film as an “anthem for incels.” A lot of the negative reviews have a similar theme: that incels would like this movie, and therefore good people wouldn’t.

 

Reviews are not "the media"...

 

No, but to me that’s the most interesting part of the story: the widespread moral revulsion at a film for the sin of exploring the pain of incels and losers.

 

Exploring pain == inevitable path to murder according to this movie.

 

As far as I'm concerned, the assertion that "good people" will reject a creative work is less an indictment than an invitation.

 

Nothing like a cry of a works moral turpitude to boost sales. The Satanic Verses would have been known largely just to English Lit majors had there not been that ridiculous fatwa from Iran.

 

Many in the news media were, as it fit their slapped together, sweeping, immature profiling narrative about a part of the American population (and a movie character they knew nothing about) in a convoluted attempt to use/anchor real tragedies (families of victims be damned) to said part of the population. Its manipulative (no surprise there) and wanted to generate nationwide fear...and the fact they aggressively tried to exploit this movie in a smoldering political season is no coincidence. There is nothing honest or in the interest of safety in what the news media's was doing regarding this film. Their coverage was all but saying "we hope this happens".

 

Seems that the President has filled you with hate for reporters and the media. You've been on an anti media and reporters binge for over a year now.

 

Hey, Michael Moore, listen up. They showed Blow Out and Zorro the Gay Blade on a movie theater marquee for a reason.

 

I don't know about Trek God, but I haven't trusted the media since I studied history and statistics in 2005.

I prefer to do my own research.