It’s 1981 in Gotham City in the new “Joker” movie.
It’s ravaged with piles of garbage littering the streets, rats on every corner of the sidewalk and a daunting homeless crisis.
The rich are getting richer, the poor getting poorer, emphasized by telecasts of wealthy executives claiming to fix their problems, but this is juxtaposed by the wretched conditions that plague Gotham City.
Amidst the ruins is Arthur Fleck, an aspiring stand up comedian who works in the daytime as a professional clown. He sits in front of a mirror, blank-faced, painting white makeup meticulously onto his face.
He attempts to smile, only to stretch the corners of his mouth into a dark and twisted grin. A single tear streaks down his face. This is the Joker.
Fleck is one of society’s “ills” who lives a life of torment and abuse as he is mocked, kicked, beaten and ridiculed by nearly every person he encounters.
He is the epitome of a loner and approaches the world with complete disengagement, full of pain and sorrow.
Every classic characteristic of the Joker is carefully crafted in a way that explains how his life of mistreatment led him to be the person he is today. Everything from the Joker’s maniacal laugh to the way he gracefully yet wickedly dances and sings.
Joaquin Phoenix, who plays the Joker, masterfully creates a grim precursor to the popular supervillain we all know and love to hate.
Phoenix is alarmingly frail, with dark protruding eye bags and a stare which can be seen straight through us. He smokes as much as he talks and shrinks down only to become an intense version of who he has always wanted to be.
His performance is mindfully executed, displaying a new kind of Joker that clearly illustrates the purpose behind the villain we come to know in Gotham City.
Phoenix’s version of the Joker is hardly comparable to the performances before him, as his execution shows who the villain was before he became a face in the DC universe.
Previous films with the Joker, such as Batman, depict the aftermath of his life as the Joker.
The 2019 movie is not the Joker that we all know. Instead it shows who the Joker used to be and foreshadows what he becomes.
Phoenix shows the makeup of the man we know – mentally, physically and emotionally. He is dark and skeletal in both his presence and his appearance.
Phoenix’s character struggles with mental illness are a direct connection with how the world treats him and the chaos which is evoked in the atmosphere that encompasses him.
The depiction of his mental illnesses emphasize our culture’s blind eye in regards to those who are seeking help.
Gotham City’s lack of care and resources for Fleck as he struggles reflects eerie parallels to a society of our own which stigmatizes those like himself.
It poses almost as a public service announcement about the extremes that can happen when we ignore such issues.
It’s not to say every mentally ill person is going to act out in ways the Joker does.
Instead, it comments on how a lack of ignorance can create monstrous results, inflicting danger and pain on others for years to come.
In the middle of Fleck’s own personal chaos, the movie takes a political stance which is strikingly similar to our own political issues in America.
The actions of Fleck as he becomes the Joker turn into a political movement in Gotham City, inciting riots and protests dividing the two classes of rich and poor.
Their severe inequality seems not too far off with the inequality some would say we face in America today.
The film also pays homage to the classic ’20s and ’40s era American culture, mixing in classic movies and musical scores that insight nostalgia.
The romanticized era of American Hollywood juxtaposed the grim and bleak version of ’80s Gotham City, a far cry from the brightly-colored and pop-y traditional view we have of the decade.
It seems as if in a dark and scary world, the Joker’s bright makeup and grotesque personality offer a horrifying escape to the world.
With appearances from Robert De Niro and Frances Conroy, the film skillfully adapts these supporting actors to fit the world the Joker manifests from his life of invisibility.
“Joker,” complemented with unique cinematography and careful screenwriting reveal a world in which the oppressed and the oppressive glimmer in glory, regardless of if that glory has positive consequences.
The film begins to neatly explain why Gotham City becomes his world, a world in which he can finally be seen.
Both horrifying and beautifully done, “Joker” re-conceptualizes one of the most iconic villains in comic book history.
