Joker (This Thread Made by Gang Weed)

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Bogus Adventure: Jan 11, 2017; More like "Bulges Adventure"

Stairmaster posted:

Arnie as bane would have been the greatest comic book casting of all time.

JBP posted:

Arnie Freeze owns.

Why not both? Hell, let's just have a Batman-Arnold Universe. Call it the Barnieverse.

# ? Oct 29, 2019 03:25

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# ? May 28, 2024 00:55

The MSJ: May 17, 2010

Coffee And Pie posted:

The worst part of grimdark Batman is it really limits what villains you can do. C’mon, make a serious Clock King movie I dare you.

The Batman animated series Clock King was a pretty creepy guy. Instead of a guy in clock pajamas who was obsessed with clocks, he's a probably-autistic man who is extremely punctual and organized.

# ? Oct 29, 2019 08:06

Isometric Bacon: Jul 24, 2004; Let's get naked!

I think this movie is much more interesting viewed
outside the Batman connections. I thought the worst parts of it were the shoe horned references to the Waynes and I can't really imagine much more beyond the immediate story of Arthur's continual downfall.

I found it a interesting character study of a guy with a mental illness in a world of a downtrodden class divide, though I don't really see it having much legs as a Joker 'origin' story. I can't really see this Joker having much of a criminal career beyond being a figurehead. It works better as 'a Joker' that inspired other ones than Arthur eventually becoming the character we see in other media.

Though I suppose without the Batman connections it'd probably be looked at it with a more critical eye, and also by a much much smaller audience. Trying to ape classic Scorcese cinema is one thing, but doing it in a mainstream comic book movie is the inspired part, given these movies are usually focus tested to the lowest possible denominator and have no trust in their audience.

# ? Oct 29, 2019 10:28

CROWS EVERYWHERE: Dec 17, 2012; CAW CAW CAW; Dinosaur Gum

Basically. It's a really good A+/S rank comic book movie, but a solid C "real" movie. I thoroughly enjoyed it and it's probably the best superhero movie I've seen but I wouldn't put it in my top 10 of all movies ever.

# ? Oct 29, 2019 12:13

iamsosmrt: Jun 14, 2008

CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:

Basically. It's a really good A+/S rank comic book movie, but a solid C "real" movie. I thoroughly enjoyed it and it's probably the best superhero movie I've seen but I wouldn't put it in my top 10 of all movies ever.

I feel almost the opposite. It's like a C comic movie and a B film. I felt the comic stuff felt a bit tacked on, but it was an interesting portrayal of society's treatment of mental illness and even how people try to frame every person's actions into a bigger political mold.

As for comic movies, I think of them as larger than life by nature, and something like the Avengers 1 or 3 is probably the pinnacle of Hollywood fully embracing comics in film IMO.

I believe if you rename every single character in Joker and change his final costume up to not look like the Joker, and it wouldn't even be remotely a comic book movie anymore, but the movie itself would be almost the same except the audience would now lack their own emotional connections and bias towards those DC characters and the movie would make much less money.

As it stands, it's ostensibly a comic movie because it references people in name.

# ? Oct 29, 2019 13:59

moana: Jun 18, 2005; one of the more intellectual satire communities on the web

CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:

it's probably the best superhero movie I've seen

Deadpool was a perfect superhero movie, less flawed than Joker imo although I enjoyed both. Does Watchmen count as a superhero movie or no?

# ? Oct 29, 2019 14:08

BioEnchanted: Aug 9, 2011; He plays for the dreamers that forgot how to dream, and the lovers that forgot how to love.

Something I liked with Joker was that Phoenix's movements were very unreal, despite how his skeleton was clearly visible he somehow moved in a very boneless-feeling way, like he was hyperextending all his joints. It brought to mind the CG for the new Cats adaption.

# ? Oct 29, 2019 23:18

The MSJ: May 17, 2010

BioEnchanted posted:

Something I liked with Joker was that Phoenix's movements were very unreal, despite how his skeleton was clearly visible he somehow moved in a very boneless-feeling way, like he was hyperextending all his joints. It brought to mind the CG for the new Cats adaption.

Missed casting opportunity.

# ? Oct 29, 2019 23:25

ruddiger: Jun 3, 2004

https://twitter.com/cenayangfilm/status/1189084284839067648?s=21

# ? Oct 29, 2019 23:26

The Kingfish: Oct 21, 2015

I loved the way Joker nervously pumped his legs. A pretty common tick in real life but not something you often see on film.

# ? Oct 30, 2019 01:16

Desperado Bones: Aug 29, 2009; Cute, adorable, and creepy at the same time!

The Kingfish posted:

I loved the way Joker nervously pumped his legs. A pretty common tick in real life but not something you often see on film.

Hah. I do that a lot, and some people find it annoying. And bouncing both legs at the same time is maximum "I am so loving anxious and nervous fuuuuuck", so that was indeed a good touch.

# ? Oct 30, 2019 03:14

Bogus Adventure: Jan 11, 2017; More like "Bulges Adventure"

ruddiger posted:

https://twitter.com/cenayangfilm/status/1189084284839067648?s=21

# ? Oct 30, 2019 06:39

McSpanky: Jan 16, 2005

iamsosmrt posted:

I feel almost the opposite. It's like a C comic movie and a B film. I felt the comic stuff felt a bit tacked on, but it was an interesting portrayal of society's treatment of mental illness and even how people try to frame every person's actions into a bigger political mold.

As for comic movies, I think of them as larger than life by nature, and something like the Avengers 1 or 3 is probably the pinnacle of Hollywood fully embracing comics in film IMO.

I believe if you rename every single character in Joker and change his final costume up to not look like the Joker, and it wouldn't even be remotely a comic book movie anymore, but the movie itself would be almost the same except the audience would now lack their own emotional connections and bias towards those DC characters and the movie would make much less money.

As it stands, it's ostensibly a comic movie because it references people in name.

Road To Perdition must've froze you up like a Star Trek computer being told a paradox.

# ? Oct 30, 2019 07:27

BioEnchanted: Aug 9, 2011; He plays for the dreamers that forgot how to dream, and the lovers that forgot how to love.

The Joker's Origin story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBxRwF4qnhU

# ? Oct 30, 2019 13:14

iamsosmrt: Jun 14, 2008

McSpanky posted:

Road To Perdition must've froze you up like a Star Trek computer being told a paradox.

Never seen it, care to explain?

# ? Oct 30, 2019 13:35

Davros1: Jul 19, 2007; You've got to admit, you are kind of implausible

The scene outside of Wayne Manor would've been a lot different if that had been Sean Pertwee's version of Alfred.

# ? Oct 30, 2019 14:02

Space Fish: Oct 14, 2008; The original Big Tuna.

Davros1 posted:

The scene outside of Wayne Manor would've been a lot different if that had been Sean Pertwee's version of Alfred.

That was my EXACT thought as soon as that scene went down. They expect us to believe a younger, fitter Alfred would've taken poo poo from some street punk? Alfred would've laid him out on the pavement, tossed him a handkerchef, and said, "And that, Master Wayne, is how one disposes of trash." Birth of Batman's meticulous beatings, right there.

# ? Oct 30, 2019 19:12

Bogus Adventure: Jan 11, 2017; More like "Bulges Adventure"

Davros1 posted:

The scene outside of Wayne Manor would've been a lot different if that had been Sean Pertwee's version of Alfred.

Pertwee's Alfred loving owns. I always lol when I see him give Bruce that metal watch so that he can beat the poo poo out of that bully, lmao.

# ? Oct 31, 2019 04:18

McSpanky: Jan 16, 2005

iamsosmrt posted:

Never seen it, care to explain?

It's a comic book movie that is very accurate to both the spirit and specifics of its source material.

That material being a drama about a Depression-era mob enforcer trying to raise his son while working for, and then being betrayed and hunted by, a brutal organized crime syndicate.

# ? Nov 1, 2019 09:31

evobatman: Jul 30, 2006; it means nothing, but says everything!; Pillbug

The Alfred scene struck me as "wrong" too. Alfred has always one way or another had a military background as a combat medic and wouldn't have taken poo poo from anyone. He fired a musket into the chest of a Predator because it was messing up Wayne Manor.

# ? Nov 1, 2019 12:55

Kurtofan: Feb 16, 2011; hon hon hon

evobatman posted:

The Alfred scene struck me as "wrong" too. Alfred has always one way or another had a military background as a combat medic and wouldn't have taken poo poo from anyone. He fired a musket into the chest of a Predator because it was messing up Wayne Manor.

i mean original alfred was a rather portly fellow

# ? Nov 2, 2019 11:52

WeedlordGoku69: Feb 12, 2015; by Cyrano4747

Alfred being ex-SAS and secretly even more badass than Bruce wasn't part of the original conception of the character, but it's been around long enough that it can be reasonably expected as a character trait in new versions, and it also rules.

(I wanna say 80s comics are responsible for that? Might be earlier.)

# ? Nov 2, 2019 20:40

JBP: Feb 16, 2017; You've got to know, to understand,
Baby, take me by my hand,
I'll lead you to the promised land.

Bruce's dad is a massive arsehole in this it's not hard to imagine Alfred is just a wussy butler.

# ? Nov 3, 2019 00:39

HUNDU THE BEAST GOD: Sep 14, 2007; everything is yours

It's Alfred as told by someone else.

# ? Nov 3, 2019 03:31

JBP: Feb 16, 2017; You've got to know, to understand,
Baby, take me by my hand,
I'll lead you to the promised land.

In a cut scene from the film Joker (2019) you discover that Alfred the Butler is in fact a former Pinochet enforcer who left when he decided that Pinochet's position on communism was not stern enough.

# ? Nov 3, 2019 03:36

ruddiger: Jun 3, 2004

https://twitter.com/mexicansoflate/status/1190761084539547648?s=21

# ? Nov 3, 2019 03:37

Desperado Bones: Aug 29, 2009; Cute, adorable, and creepy at the same time!

ruddiger posted:

https://twitter.com/mexicansoflate/status/1190761084539547648?s=21

Thanks, that account had this unrelated cursed post:

https://twitter.com/MexicansOfLate/status/1184471768897064963

:gonk:

I can hear their posh accents.

# ? Nov 3, 2019 05:43

WeedlordGoku69: Feb 12, 2015; by Cyrano4747

God, this movie whips rear end.

Like, I didn't know Todd Phillips had this in him, god drat. For all the hurfa-durf surrounding it, this is a really astoundingly empathetic movie and one of the loudest and angriest "eat the rich" statements I've ever seen. It's fundamentally a movie about how hosed it is that Reagan destroyed public mental health services, and how the rich need to have loving vengeance wrought upon them for doing that.

It was frankly refreshing as hell.

# ? Nov 3, 2019 21:17

LinkesAuge: Sep 7, 2011

LORD OF BOOTY posted:

God, this movie whips rear end.

Like, I didn't know Todd Phillips had this in him, god drat. For all the hurfa-durf surrounding it, this is a really astoundingly empathetic movie and one of the loudest and angriest "eat the rich" statements I've ever seen. It's fundamentally a movie about how hosed it is that Reagan destroyed public mental health services, and how the rich need to have loving vengeance wrought upon them for doing that.

It was frankly refreshing as hell.

I don't know, to me it feels it misses the mark when it comes to the whole class struggle. Joker certainly isn't a sympathatic figurehead for that. Is his story tragic and sad? Sure but his actions (as well as the directionless destruction by the protests) kinda prove the point of the "rich", not to mention that Bruce's parents are victims at the end of the story.
On top of that you have his mother, a working class person, that is responsible for abusing her own child. Someone else already mentioned that the movie is in general just misantrophic and I think that's closer to the truth than a positive message about class struggle (his own co-workers were also not friendly to him except one person so he didn't even find solace within his own class).

# ? Nov 3, 2019 22:59

Necrothatcher: Mar 26, 2005

LinkesAuge posted:

I don't know, to me it feels it misses the mark when it comes to the whole class struggle. Joker certainly isn't a sympathatic figurehead for that. Is his story tragic and sad? Sure but his actions (as well as the directionless destruction by the protests) kinda prove the point of the "rich", not to mention that Bruce's parents are victims at the end of the story.

I think stories like this are much more effective when the person suffering because of the system isn't sympathetic. Usually it comes off as didactic if they're some put upon saint.

# ? Nov 3, 2019 23:09

WeedlordGoku69: Feb 12, 2015; by Cyrano4747

LinkesAuge posted:

I don't know, to me it feels it misses the mark when it comes to the whole class struggle. Joker certainly isn't a sympathatic figurehead for that. Is his story tragic and sad? Sure but his actions (as well as the directionless destruction by the protests) kinda prove the point of the "rich", not to mention that Bruce's parents are victims at the end of the story.
On top of that you have his mother, a working class person, that is responsible for abusing her own child. Someone else already mentioned that the movie is in general just misantrophic and I think that's closer to the truth than a positive message about class struggle (his own co-workers were also not friendly to him except one person so he didn't even find solace within his own class).

But the thing is, at the end of the day, it's not other poor people that hosed Arthur over and created this hosed up situation. If the public mental health system hadn't been defunded, and if Arthur had any kind of support structure other than a whole bunch of similarly-broken people unequipped to support him, there would be no movie.

The poor aren't strictly sympathetic in Joker, but it's also very explicitly not their fault. Society hates the mentally ill and hates the poor; anyone in one of those categories is going to get hosed over and traumatized, and someone in both is gonna basically be Arthur.

# ? Nov 4, 2019 00:06

ruddiger: Jun 3, 2004

The only concrete thing to come out of Joker is Todd Phillips has clearly never taken the subway.

# ? Nov 4, 2019 01:16

ruddiger: Jun 3, 2004

quote:

Critics weren�t sure how to categorize Joker: is it just a piece of entertainment (like other Batman films), an in-depth study of the genesis of pathological violence, or an exercise in cultural theory? From his radical leftist standpoint, Michael Moore called it �a timely piece of social criticism and a perfect illustration of the consequences of America�s current social ills�, pointing out that it explores the protagonist�s origin story, examines the role of bankers, the collapse of healthcare and the divide between rich and poor. However, Joker does not only depict this America, it also raises a �discomfiting question� in Moore�s mind: what if one day the dispossessed decide to fight back?

Before Joker was released, the media and the FBI warned us it may incite violence from incels, though in the event there were no such reports. Rather than feeling inspired to commit acts of violence, viewers �will thank this movie for connecting you to a new desire � not to run to the nearest exit to save your own rear end but rather to stand and fight and focus your attention on the nonviolent power you hold in your hands every single day,� as Moore puts it.

But does it really work like that? The �new desire� he mentions is not Joker�s desire � at the film�s end, the anti-hero is powerless, and his violent outbursts are just impotent explosions of rage, expressions of his basic powerlessness. The paradox is that you become truly violent (in the sense of posing a threat to the existing system) only when you renounce physical violence. This does not mean that Joker�s actions are futile � the lesson of the film is that we have to go through this zero-point to liberate ourselves from the illusions that pertain to the existing order.

Among other things, our immersion into the dark world of Joker cures us of politically correct illusions and simplifications, like sexual consent for example. In this world, you cannot take seriously the idea that consent to sexual relations makes them truly consensual. The �consent discourse� is itself a huge sham. It is a naive effort to overlay a neat-and-tidy intelligible egalitarian language of social justice over the dark, discomforting, relentlessly cruel, traumatic realm of sexuality. People do not know what they want, they are disturbed by what they desire, they desire things that they hate, they hate their mothers but want to gently caress their mothers, and so on, for eternity. We can easily imagine Joker reacting with wild laughter to the claim that �it was consensual, so it was OK�, since that�s how his mother ruined his life.

To quote Arthur from the film: �I�ve got nothing left to lose. Nothing can hurt me anymore. My life is nothing but a comedy.� This zero-point is today�s version of what was once called a proletarian position, the experience of those who have nothing to lose. This is where the idea that Trump is a kind of Joker in power finds its limit: Trump definitely did not go through this zero-point. He may be an obscene clown in his own way, but he is not a Joker figure � it�s an insult to Joker to compare him with Trump.

Trump is obscene in acting the way he acts, but in this way he merely brings out the obscenity that is the obverse of the law itself. There is nothing suicidal about Trump�s boasting of how he breaks the rules, it is simply part of his message that he is a tough guy beset by corrupt elites, and that his transgressions are necessary because only a rule breaker can crush the power of the Washington swamp. To read this well-planned and very rational strategy in terms of death-drive is yet another example of how it is the left-liberals who are really on a suicidal mission, giving rise to the impression that they are engaged in bureaucratic-legal nagging while the president is doing a good job for the country.

In Christopher Nolan�s The Dark Knight, the Joker is the only figure of truth: the goal of his terrorist attacks on Gotham City is made clear. They will stop when Batman takes off his mask and reveals his true identity. What, then, is Joker who wants to disclose the truth beneath the mask, convinced that this disclosure will destroy the social order? He is not a man without a mask, but, on the contrary, a man fully identified with his mask, a man who IS his mask � there is nothing, no �ordinary guy�, beneath it. Nolan�s Joker has no back-story and lacks any clear motivation: he tells different people different stories about his scars, mocking the idea that he should have some deep-rooted trauma that drives him.

Joker becomes Joker at a precise moment in the film, when he says: �You know what really makes me laugh? I used to think that my life was a tragedy. But now I realize, it�s a loving comedy.� Because of this act, Joker may not be moral, but he is ethical. We should take note of the exact moment when Arthur says this: while, standing by the side of his mother�s bed, he takes her pillow and uses it to smother her to death. Who, then, is his mother? �She always tells me to smile and put on a happy face. She says I was put here to spread joy and laughter.� Is this not maternal superego at its purest? No wonder she calls him Happy, not Arthur. He gets rid of his mother�s hold on him (by killing her) through fully identifying with her command to laugh. His propensity to compulsive and uncontrollable outbursts of laughter is paradoxical: it is quite literally extimate (to use Lacan�s neologism), intimate and external. Arthur insists that it forms the very core of his subjectivity: �Remember you used to tell me that my laugh was a condition, that there was something wrong with me? It isn�t. That�s the real me.� But it is external to him, to his personality, experienced by him as an automated partial object that he cannot control and that he ends up fully identifying with. The paradox here is that in the standard Oedipal scenario, it is the Name-of-the-Father which enables an individual to escape the clutches of maternal desire; with Joker, paternal function is nowhere to be seen, so that the subject can outdo mother only by over-identifying with her superego command.

At the film�s end, Joker is a new tribal leader with no political program, just an explosion of negativity � in his conversation with Murray, Arthur insists twice that his act is not political. Referring to his clown makeup, Murray asks him: �What�s with the face? I mean, are you part of the protest?� Arthur replies: �No, I don�t believe any of that. I don�t believe in anything. I just thought it�d be good for my act.� And, again, later: �I�m not political. I�m just trying to make people laugh.�

There is no militant left in the film�s universe, it�s just a flat world of globalized violence and corruption. Charity events are depicted as what they are: if a mother Theresa figure were there she would participate in the charity event organized by Wayne, a humanitarian amusement of the privileged rich. However, it�s difficult to imagine a more stupid critique of Joker than the reproach that it doesn�t portray a positive alternative to the Joker revolt. Just imagine a film shot along these lines: an edifying story about how the poor, unemployed, with no health coverage, the victims of street gangs and police brutality, etc, organize non-violent protests and strikes to mobilize public opinion � a new non-racial version of Martin Luther King. It would be an extremely boring film, lacking the crazy excesses that makes Joker such an attractive film for viewers.

Here we get to the crux of the matter: since it seems obvious to a leftist that such non-violent protests and strikes are the only way to proceed to exert efficient pressure on those in power, are we dealing here with a simple gap between political logic and narrative efficiency? To put it bluntly, brutal outbursts like those of Joker are as damaging as they are effective, but they make for an interesting story. My hypothesis is that you have to go through the self-destructive zero-level for which Joker stands � not actually, but you have to experience it as a threat, as a possibility. Only in this way can you break out of the coordinates of the existing system and envisage something truly new.

In his interpretation of the fall of East European Communism, Habermas proved to be the ultimate left Fukuyamaist, silently accepting that the existing liberal-democratic is the best possible, and that, while we should strive to make it more just, et cetera, we should not challenge its basic premises. This is why he welcomed precisely what many leftists saw as the big deficiency of the anti-Communist protests in Eastern Europe: the fact that this protests were not motivated by any new visions of the post-Communist future � as he put it, the central and eastern European revolutions were just what he called �rectifying� or �catch-up� revolutions: their aim was to enable central and eastern European societies to gain what the western Europeans already possessed, i.e., to rejoin the Western normality. However, the ongoing wave of protests in different parts of the world tends to question this very frame � and this is why figures like �jokers� accompany them.

When a movement questions the fundamentals of the existing order, its very foundations, it is almost impossible to get just peaceful protests without violent excesses. The elegance of Joker resides in how the move from self-destructive drive to a �new desire� for an emancipatory political project is absent from the film�s storyline: we, the spectators, are solicited to fill in this absence.

# ? Nov 4, 2019 01:34

WeedlordGoku69: Feb 12, 2015; by Cyrano4747

Frankly, I think people are overthinking a movie that's pretty loving blunt and direct about its message. Rich people are monsters, so kill them until they no longer exist.

Arthur may not exemplify this himself- he more or less blindly lucked into this through most of the people who harmed him being rich- but it's not an accident that the "directionless violence" is performed against an analogue for Donald Trump by a mob holding signs calling him a fascist and saying "eat the rich." The Joker may himself be apolitical, but his actions are read as a symbol of revolution by the populace; a revolution that the film very directly agrees with.

# ? Nov 4, 2019 02:55

The MSJ: May 17, 2010

https://twitter.com/ajplus/status/1187044390633660416

People are also doing it at protests in Chile, Hong Kong, and other places.

# ? Nov 4, 2019 03:26

Hodgepodge: Jan 29, 2006; Can't post for 213 days!

The MSJ posted:

https://twitter.com/ajplus/status/1187044390633660416

People are also doing it at protests in Chile, Hong Kong, and other places.

Can we do Bane this way next? :getin:

# ? Nov 4, 2019 06:18

WeedlordGoku69: Feb 12, 2015; by Cyrano4747

The MSJ posted:

https://twitter.com/ajplus/status/1187044390633660416

People are also doing it at protests in Chile, Hong Kong, and other places.

Case in point.

People aren't exactly confused by what this movie is trying to say. It's about as subtle as a sign getting smashed over your head (if you'll pardon me being glib). It's saying "eat the loving rich and powerful before they eat you," and people are getting this, even across language barriers. Even fuckin' chuds are getting it (and proceeding to get pretty mad at the movie).

This movie whips scrote, god drat.

# ? Nov 4, 2019 06:21

ruddiger: Jun 3, 2004

Chuds love this movie and consider it the answer to the �forced diversity� of the MCU (their words).

# ? Nov 4, 2019 06:37

WeedlordGoku69: Feb 12, 2015; by Cyrano4747

ruddiger posted:

Chuds love this movie and consider it the answer to the “forced diversity” of the MCU (their words).

I have a weird feeling they're not actually watching it and are doing the same poo poo they did with Alita. Whenever I see a review of the movie that's clearly from someone chuddy who actually watched it, they're mad as gently caress that it's mean to rich people and that it empathizes with a man who isn't bootstrapping himself up.

# ? Nov 4, 2019 06:58

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# ? May 28, 2024 00:55

Sleeveless: Dec 25, 2014; by Pragmatica

The MSJ posted:

https://twitter.com/ajplus/status/1187044390633660416

People are also doing it at protests in Chile, Hong Kong, and other places.

LORD OF BOOTY posted:

Case in point.

People aren't exactly confused by what this movie is trying to say. It's about as subtle as a sign getting smashed over your head (if you'll pardon me being glib). It's saying "eat the loving rich and powerful before they eat you," and people are getting this, even across language barriers. Even fuckin' chuds are getting it (and proceeding to get pretty mad at the movie).

This movie whips scrote, god drat.

It's true, only good movies with intelligent plots and cohesive worldviews get adopted as symbols by protestors. Joker is in incredibly good company.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mobWJFfV3I

# ? Nov 4, 2019 20:59

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Cinema Discusso > Joker (This Thread Made by Gang Weed)

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