Joker: Folie à Deux review – Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga shine in downbeat sequel

The sequel lacks the intensity of Joker but is still a brooding tale that works hard to reinvent the comic book movie.

Lady Gaga and Joaquin Phoenix in Joker 2.

Warner Bros / DC Studios

★★★★☆

Joker: Folie à Deux premiered at the Venice Film Festival and will be in cinemas from 4 October. Add it to your watchlist.

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Back in 2019, Joker premiered at the Venice Film Festival, going on to win the top prize of the Golden Lion. Five years on, the sequel Joker: Folie à Deux arrives, back in competition at the festival.

Joaquin Phoenix returns as Arthur Fleck, the role that won him an Oscar, in a story that, despite lacking the intensity of the original, still has the capacity to surprise. Todd Phillips, also returning as director, has turned this grim, grey Gotham psychodrama into a musical of sorts, with Phoenix and co singing old standards. Weird? Well, it works. Kind of.

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Fleck, better known to his supporters as the psychopathic clown Joker, is now in Arkham Asylum, awaiting to see if he will stand trial for five murders, including the killing of TV host Murray Franklin on live TV.

Already his fame has spread so much that a television movie has been made of his adventures, although the authorities refuse to let him watch it (a running joke sees him obsess over whether it’s any good or not).

Still skeletal thin, Fleck is almost catatonic at the outset, until a prison guard (Brendan Gleeson) gets him into a music class. There, he meets Lee Quinzel (Lady Gaga) – aka Harley Quinn, the Joker’s love interest throughout DC Comics lore.

Committed to the institution by her mother after she set fire to her parents' apartment, she strikes up a bond with Fleck. "We’re gonna build a mountain," she promises. They even get intimate in his cell, just after she daubs his face with blusher (you might call it the weirdest 'make-up sex' you’ll ever see).

With Fleck’s lawyer (Catherine Keener) looking to improve his public image, an exclusive TV interview with a dirt-digging reporter, played by Steve Coogan, is also set up.

As Fleck’s defence pleads that he has a multiple personality disorder, this rather taps into the various musical numbers, which often play out as if they’re in his head, much like the way he imagined his comedy career in the original movie.

Indeed, it makes sense that former stand-up comic Fleck should burst into song, seeing as he has always believed himself as the consummate entertainer. There’s even a interlude called the Joker & Harley Show, with the two looking like Sonny and Cher.

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With the musical numbers running throughout, songs range from That’s Entertainment to (They Long To Be) Close To You, although neither Phoenix nor Gaga belt out the tunes. Rather, in keeping with the film’s atmosphere, performances are muted, both vocally and when it comes to the choreography. Don’t expect to see Joaquin tap-dancing à la Fred Astaire.

By the second half, Joker: Folie à Deux – the title translates from French meaning a mental illness shared by two people – mutates into courtroom drama, as Fleck goes to trial. The clown is suddenly the main attraction in this particular circus.

If you can believe it, the film is even more downbeat than its predecessor, despite the musical element, thanks to the grim atmosphere that Phillips lathers on. It also goes some way to distancing itself from the nihilistic incel-culture that simmered in the background of the earlier movie, despite violent riots once again brewing on the streets of Gotham.

A black and white still showing Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn and Joaquin Pheonix as Joker in Joker Folie a Deux. Thet are dancing on a rooftop, he in a balck suit and she in a white dress

Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn and Joaquin Pheonix as Joker in Joker: Folie à Deux. WB

There’s also zero mention of Batman, making this a story far removed from the Caped Crusader's crime-fighting universe as you could possibly get.

Phoenix is seamless, picking up this maudlin character again as if it were only yesterday. It’s a truly versatile, malleable performance.

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Meanwhile, Gaga makes for a good sparring partner, her Harley far more low-key than the recent version played by Margot Robbie. While the film arguably lacks the rage-fuelled intensity of Joker, this is still a brooding tale that works hard to reinvent the comic book movie.

Authors

James Mottram

James Mottram is a London-based film critic, journalist, and author.

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