You might remember the 2019 movie sensation Joker. Todd Phillips, the guy who made the Hangovers, directed an allegedly searing portrait of mental illness, thwarted masculinity, and society in collapse all subversively under the aegis of the legendary Batman villain. It culminated in Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker/Arthur Fleck shooting a talk show host in the head on live TV, kicking off smoldering Gotham City riots and a litany of destruction. Some critics found the movie morally reprehensible or culturally irresponsible; some insisted it would spark actual violence. Mostly what it did was collect some gritty vintage New York cinema influences (namely Taxi Driver and King of Comedy) to refigure an iconic character adored by fans as an unknowable agent of chaos into a pretty banal “last angry man.” It’s hard to determine even now whether it was the angry critics or the stupid movie that was more disingenuous, but nevertheless the film won multiple Oscars and grossed a billion dollars.
So, now, foregone conclusion, we have Joker: Folie à Deux, its sequel. Arthur is committed to Gotham’s infamous Arkham Asylum where he awaits trial. It’s as stereotypical a miserable hellhole of insanity as you can imagine, with grimy concrete, ceilings dripping from constant torrential rain, mildewed tiles, twitching violent inmates — name the visual cliché, it’s here. But a ray of sunshine interrupts all this misery when Arthur meets Lee, AKA Harleen Quinzel (Lady Gaga), who recognizes, lionizes, and indeed falls in love with him (and he her), their romance causing spontaneous eruptions of imaginary singing, bringing sound and color and affection — and maybe even purpose — to Arthur’s life for the perhaps the first time.
So why is it all so boring? Let’s be clear, Folie à Deux is emphatically not as diabolically full of shit as the original movie. It has largely jettisoned any attempts at social commentary or diagnosis of just what is wrong with society, man, in favor of painting its protagonist as merely desperately lonely for connection, for warmth, for trust, almost as if this was Phillips’ intent all along (which it wasn’t, but let’s let him have his fantasy — that would be all of a piece with this movie, after all). The extremely self-conscious bleakness feels less like an affectation and more of a surreal choice here, which is indeed certainly a choice, but also merely differently dull. The musical interruptions are mostly bereft of imagination — the characters break into song, yes, but they’re mostly snippets of old standards like “That’s Entertainment” or “What the World Needs Now is Love,” and none of them feature an entire song. And only a couple of scenes become full musical moments with a fantasy set or some other such element. There are no full numbers. It’s a wasted gimmick.
And a gimmick is frankly all the whole thing is, since most of the film is taken up by Arthur’s trial, during which characters from the first movie return to testify in court about those events, sort of like the Seinfeld finale. The romance between Arthur and Lee is largely sidelined in favor of this narrative framework and the lackluster singing. Phoenix, who won this Oscar for playing Arthur in what must be this very good actor’s least interesting performance, seems so locked into Intense Mode™ that he seems actively bored with it. Gaga, for her part, is utterly wasted. She’s extremely capable of playing Lee’s desperate, delusional love, but mostly she just whispers quietly, and is somehow never once even allowed to really belt out a song.
As a result of all these confounding decisions, the movie as a whole winds up completely frictionless. Despite its myriad flaws, Joker at least had momentum, trajectory, a narrative that built structurally and emotionally to a perhaps inevitable and dreadful climax. Folie à Deux struggles desperately for energy and for emotion, but simply never finds it. It’s just a slog without a new idea to contribute. At one point, in a fateful scene, Arthur sees Lee for maybe the last time and says, “I don’t want to sing anymore.” In this moment, it feels like even Folie à Deux itself is asking if it can just be over.
DIRECTOR: Todd Phillips; CAST: Joaquin Phoenix, Lady Gaga, Zazie Beetz, Brendan Gleeson, Steve Coogan; DISTRIBUTOR: Warner Bros.; IN THEATERS: October 4; RUNTIME: 2 hr. 18 min.
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