Links - 21st December 2019 (2) (Joker)

Rachel Miller - "Okay I've pinpointed exactly what it is that bothers me about a Joker movie.
I don't want to watch a movie that shows us the trauma that drove the Joker insane.
I don't want to watch a well-intentioned but unstable man get bullied until he turns into a mass murderer.
I don't want to watch a man get rejected by women as an excuse for his future of domestic abuse.
I don't want to be shown what a poor, unfortunate underdog this man was who was sadly forced by circumstances and that nasty Batman to take up a life of crime.
I don't want to have sympathy for a man best known for his robbery, murder and arguable rape shoved down my throat for two hours.
I don't want this to be sold as a relatable story that can happen to anyone with a bad enough day, and I don't want to be around any of the lonely white boys who relate to it.
Do you see what I'm getting at?
I don't know if there ever is a good time for a movie that paints mass murder as the logical conclusion of a socially isolated, debateably neurodivergent white man being failed by the system, but I feel as though this is not fucking it.
I don't want to see a movie that idolizes the Joker when there are plenty of easily armed fuckboys who already think he has the right idea, without adding a tragic backstory to elicit sympathy.
I ALSO don't want the narrative line to be drawn between mental illness and mass murder, as is so often done in modern eras to Batman villains, and as is so common with the Joker in particular I don't want it to get highlighted and underlined in Sharpie as well.
God I'm sick of the Joker."
Empathy is only good when it's for the right people

Sophia Narwitz on Twitter - ""I don't think the Academy should honor a film with such controversial elements." Oscar voters weigh in on #Joker"
"Two years ago you gave an Oscar to a film where a woman fucks a fish."

Dataracer on Twitter - "2019: The Joker is problematic & will inspire white incels to commit mass murder.
2013: I love the Joker. You can't spell slaughter without laughter.
Heather Antos is completely full of crap."

Unofficial Artist formally known as Diversity and Comics Yaboiposting - Posts - "Why are these people so afraid to acknowledge that some white guys aren’t exactly living a perfect life? Unlike crazy SJWs, a white guy saying he feels depressed and beaten down by society, more than likely is not saying he wants first place in the Oppression Olympics. They just want their lives to get better and not dwell in victimhood. Not everyone wants to watch cartoons about weirdo lesbians where bad guys aren’t really bad guys ( a la Steven Universe and She-Ra). Some people want real stories and real conflict. If anything, the Joker will “deradicalize” angry white guys by showing them they’re not a lone in their suffering and it’s best to not let it go as far as the Joker takes it. He may be the Protagonist of this movie, but no one has implied he’s a hero (shit, the movie is not even out. We don’t ever really know the whole plot.)"
On the above
Comments: "“I want to see everyone represented in movies! I want everyone to be able to see themselves in the characters! Except people I don’t like!”"
"Somebody spoonfeed me some safe, morally unambiguous drivel that perfectly aligns with my values or else I'll complain on the internet"

Joker: Joaquin Phoenix movie gets eight-minute standing ovation at Venice premiere - "Starring Joaquin Phoenix as Batman’s nemesis and directed by Todd Phillips, the new movie is already sparking awards buzz, with Venice artistic director Alberto Barbera saying it is headed “straight to the Oscars”.The Independent’s reviewer Geoffrey Macnab described the film as “powerful and original” and said Phoenix plays the character “in a way that makes him seem both sympathetic and very creepy”.Variety’s film critic also praised the movie, writing: “Phoenix is astonishing as a mentally ill geek who becomes the killer-clown Joker in Todd Phillips’ neo-Taxi Driver knockout: the rare comic-book movie that expresses what’s happening in the real world.”"
Too bad the protagonist is the wrong colour

Sarthak Raj Baral's answer to Do you think the movie Joker (2019) will bring the game back in DC's favour against Marvel? - Quora - "Oh, it can do so much more than that.But not because of Joker’s stellar reviews, not because of Phoenix’s supposedly transcendent performance and not because of the movie’s box office potential. The MCU has also had movies that have achieved most of those things.Joker is in a position to finally develop into the movie that altogether transcends its comic book origins.Why do I say that? Because it won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival.It became the first comic-book movie to win the top award at a major film festival... Venice Film Festival is the oldest and the second largest film festival in the world.The jury there do not care about political correctness or the commercial prospects of the movie – they awarded the Grand Jury Prize to Roman Polanski's An Officer and a Spy.That decision indicates something important - The jury care only about the artistic integrity of the movies they screen."

Dataracer on Twitter - "Joker had a 89% on Rotten Tomatoes after winning the Venice Film Festival.
SJW film critics have down voted it to 78% with politically motivated reviews.
"Very real violence by today's young men. Has a bad moral compass. As social commentary Joker is garbage. Will be divisive.""

Joker Premiere Disinvites Journalists Amid Criticisms of Promoting Violence - "Director Todd Phillips has fielded similar questions despite saying his film doesn’t glorify violence and wasn’t created to “push buttons.”... “The movie still takes place in a fictional world. It can have real-world invocations, options, but it’s a fictional character in a fictional world that’s been around for 80 years,” Phillips continued of his Gotham City-set Joker. “The one that bugs me more is the toxic white male thing when you go, ‘Oh, I just saw John Wick 3.’ He’s a white male who kills 300 people and everybody’s laughing and hooting and hollering. Why does this movie get held to different standards? It honestly doesn’t make sense to me.”... In a statement published on Tuesday, WB said that “neither the fictional character Joker, nor the film, is an endorsement of real-world violence of any kind. It is not the intention of the film, the filmmakers or the studio to hold this character up as a hero.”"
And to think people mocked Singapore for classifying the Da Vinci code as NC-16 so as not to mislead children

Unofficial Artist formally known as Diversity and Comics Yaboiposting - Posts - "Brie Larson: "I don't need a 37 year old barely-employed journalist to tell me what didn't work for him about "Joker". It wasn't made for him.""

Army issues warning about potential mass shooting incidents with release of upcoming “Joker” movie - "Military commanders in Oklahoma were warned of the potential threat of violence at the theatrical release of the upcoming “Joker” movie, though law enforcement officials are not sure which theaters may be affected... “I would just argue that you might want to watch the movie,” Phillips told the website IGN. “You might want to watch it with an open mind.”"

Everyone in Joker Audience Waiting for Right Moment to Do Mass Shooting - "“I came here to do a shooting myself,” he stated before hitting a vape, swigging Mountain Dew, and exhaling the vapor. “I came all strapped up. I had my AR-15, my Mossberg Shockwave, I even had two Berettas I was gonna shoot at the same time like The Matrix, then I noticed another guy getting out of his car with an AR-15! I was like, ‘Hey man! Back off. This one’s taken!’”Stefano Costa, 22, a comic book store employee, was also dismayed to find out he had been beaten to the punch."

'Joker' producer defends movie over mass shooter fears - "The executive producer of “Joker” has defended the movie over fears it may incite mass shooters — insisting people cannot “run” from the ugliest sides of society.“Look at what I consider some of the most important films: What have they done? They’ve held up a mirror to our society, and there are times when people don’t want to see that reflection, they want to run from it,” Michael Uslan told the Asbury Park Press... Uslan pointed to other key movies that have told troubling stories of violence, including “Mean Streets” and “A Clockwork Orange.”“If anything, I believe movies can shake people up and bring issues to attention, whether it’s about guns or the need to treat mental illness or the need for civility and for us to start talking with each other instead of at each other again”"

Joker filmmaker enrages 'woke culture' proponents by (accurately) blaming the tyranny of outrage for death of comedy - "What Phillips called "woke culture" - a pathological eagerness to avoid insensitivity that weaponizes the worst excesses of political correctness - has made comedy all but impossible because it has made the cost of failure too high. A single failed joke can cost a comedian their livelihood if it offends the wrong people - and who can create when their hands are tied?... he is far from the only "f***ing funny guy" who has done the risk-benefit analysis and found comedy to be not worth the penalty for offending modern audiences... It was safe to bomb in comedy a decade ago. One could make an "edgy" joke, miss the mark, brush off the boos from the audience, and try again. Now, miss the mark and offend someone when the right person in the audience is filming and your career could be over in 24 hours. Numerous comedians have spoken out about the pressure this puts on their performances... Comedy veteran Mel Brooks called political correctness "the death of comedy" two years ago, pointing out that "comedy has to walk a thin line, take risks." And things have only gotten worse since 2017 regarding "cancel culture," with woke commandos performing deep-dives into old tweets and old routines from Kevin Hart and Sarah Silverman, forcing Hart to resign from an Oscar-hosting gig and getting Silverman fired from a movie project.  In both cases, the "offensive" material was not considered particularly controversial at the time.Monty Python's John Cleese was one of several comics who were already refusing to perform on college campuses in 2016, thanks to the stifling PC climate, observing that the desire to avoid offense had mutated into "the point where any kind of criticism of any kind of individual or group can be labelled cruel." Now, the suffocating blanket of "wokeness" has escaped the campuses and infiltrated the comedy clubs. Performers walk on eggshells, living in fear of stumbling onto an ever-multiplying snarl of cultural third rails. George Carlin's seven dirty words were nothing - "woke culture" has declared entire books' worth of words off-limits.Even political comedy has gotten wealthy and complacent. Big-name comedians like Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert don't want to risk their seven-figure paychecks by "taking the piss out of the ruling class," progressive political comedian Jimmy Dore has pointed out. Dore has slammed TV comedians for limiting themselves to "low-hanging fruit" like President Donald Trump without touching the system that produced him. Saturday Night Live - a show that, in its early years, hosted exciting, edgy talent willing to take risks - has become the Orange Man Bad Show, with its 45th season premiere featuring three whole segments about Trump's impeachment. Not coincidentally, ratings dropped 30 percent for the younger demographic and 15 percent overall compared to the previous year. Even bland mainstream comics like Jerry Seinfeld have said political correctness is hurting comedy and have echoed Cleese's fear of performing at colleges.  If even sitcom hacks are afraid to perform, what does that say about "woke culture?" Ironically, 'Joker' - the film that has Phillips in the hot seat and the wokesters up in arms - is the story of a failed standup comedian who turns to crime after the comedy world, and the real world, beats the stuffing out of him, literally and metaphorically. Perhaps the woke masses canceling performers left and right should take note - robbing artists of their creative outlet could have unforeseen consequences."

"Joker" Director Todd Phillips Blames "Woke" Culture For Leaving Comedy - "“Go try to be funny nowadays with this woke culture,” Phillips said. “There were articles written about why comedies don’t work anymore — I’ll tell you why, because all the fucking funny guys are like, ‘Fuck this shit, because I don’t want to offend you.’""It’s hard to argue with 30 million people on Twitter. You just can’t do it, right?" he added. "So you just go, ‘I’m out.’" Phillips said the idea for Joker — an antihero comic book origin story in the vein of Taxi Driver set in a dark and gritty 1970s Gotham — stemmed from a desire to want to remain irreverent, but not funny... Phillips blamed the controversy around the movie on the "far left.""

Director Todd Phillips Says "Far Left" Responsible for Joker Backlash - "“I think it’s because outrage is a commodity,” Phillips stated in the new interview. “I think it’s something that has been a commodity for a while. What’s outstanding to me in this discourse in this movie is how easily the far left can sound like the far right when it suits their agenda. It’s really been eye opening for me.” The controversy around the first R-rated Bat-movie seems to have taken Phillips slightly off guard, as he said he didn’t intend for “the movie to push buttons.” He explained, “I literally described to Joaquin at one point in those three months as like, ‘Look at this as a way to sneak a real movie in the studio system under the guise of a comic book film.’ It wasn’t, ‘We want to glorify this behavior.’”"

Why the Joker Has Provoked a Backlash - "Given that ultra-violent R-rated movies are released almost every week—The Joker contains far fewer on-screen deaths than other recent releases like Rambo or Angel Has Fallen—to little fanfare and without provoking anything remotely like imitative crime, why are so many movie critics decrying the supposed moral vacuity of The Joker?Let’s dispense with the veneer of worry. Underlying many of the negative reviews is the insidious suggestion that some unhappy sucker might decide to imitate the Joker.  However, as with video game violence, there’s no evidence that movie violence causes real-life violence. In fact, crime tends to drop on weekends on which violent R-rated movies are released. These claims are the result of moral panic, pure and simple... Some folks have made bizarre references to the Aurora shooting from 2012, which took place at a theater showing another Batman movie, despite the fact that claims that the shooter was inspired by the Joker have been debunked.Some of the reviews seem to almost be rooting for the occurence of a horrible imitative crime to provide an I told you so moment.  It’s probably human nature to want to be right when predicting a tragedy, if that will somehow confirm one’s own moral stature. If anything, however, all the hype about possible violence might provide more of a motivation for violence than the movie itself... I suspect that all the pearl-clutching over imitative violence is a smokescreen for the real objection: the movie’s moral ambiguity and its subtle hints that society, on both left and right, is making things worse for people in pain. Moral righteousness has historically been the purview of the right, but, in recent years, the left have been catching up in the realm of moral entrepreneurship.  Much of the progressive movement has begun to adopt simplistic narratives of good and evil, often based on identity politics. Some elements of the far left have been voicing bigoted statements about race and gender—just of a different variety from those of the alt-right.One undercurrent causing all this chatter is the popular myth that mass homicides are mainly perpetrated by white men with racist or misogynistic motives. In fact, the ethnic composition of mass homicide perpetrators is similar to that of the general US population... The Joker exposes this societal indifference and suggests that, even if evil people bear the ultimate responsibility for their choices, societal elites also deserve some blame for doing next to nothing to help those who are struggling. The right have been criticized for this for decades, but all the tittering about incels, toxic masculinity and other unhelpful concepts on the part of the far left is only increasing hate, rather than helping us develop a sense of shared community.The Joker is a morally nuanced story that calls upon us to understand how the protagonist came to be who he is, and how society contributed to that transformation. Dan Brooks rightly notes that the critics’ hand-wringing over the film’s impact on the masses (an impact to which the critics themselves are apparently morally immune) is a kind of condescension: “Critics, after all, are the ones warning us that millions of undersexed morons are about to watch a movie they won’t understand. And it’s critics telling us, in a tone of concern for their fellow man, that these losers are total misanthropes.” This kind of movie criticism isn’t much better than Robert DeNiro’s cruel mockery of Arthur Fleck’s failed attempts at stand-up comedy... Too often, we look for ways to be virtuous at others’ expense. We should never condone violence. But The Joker suggests that we could do a better job of identifying people before they reach that point and getting them effective, evidence-based help. That would take determined effort on our part and tax money. So perhaps—like too many characters in the film—we’ll find it easier to simply point and laugh."

Media Horrified By Lack Of Violence At Joker Screenings | The Babylon Bee - "“We found one incident of a guy cheering too loudly at the fictional violence,” said CNN reporter Terrance Shelton, “but that was it. There was nothing. Absolutely nothing we can glom onto and spin into a hot take that reinforces The Narrative. I’m shaken to my core.”Journalists have already been shaken by many attacks on the press. Much of this has come from President Trump, but a lot also from reality, which has specifically gone after many of their hyped predictions and disasters. “We had expert opinions saying that the Joker movie was just adding fuel to the fire with all that’s going on,” said New York Times writer Glenn Peterson. “And once again, reality has defied experts. That’s not right.”Now that opinion writers' fears have been disproven, the pundits whose predictions were completely wrong and who have demonstrated they have no grasp of how reality actually works are expecting the harshest punishment for such a journalistic failure: absolutely nothing."

Joker Review: Joaquin Phoenix Overacts So Hard It's No Fun - "Phoenix is acting so hard you can feel the desperation throbbing in his veins. He leaves you wanting to start him a GoFundMe, so he won’t have to pour so much sweat into his job again. But the aggressive terribleness of his performance isn’t completely his fault" - Stephanie Zacharek (20 on Metacritic)
Ghostbusters Review: Busting Ghosts in the Here and Now - "The movie glows with vitality, thanks largely to the performers, who revel in one another’s company" - Stephanie Zacharek (80 on Metacritic)
Moral of the story: do the opposite of what this 'film critic' says you should do

FBI Says They Are Closely Monitoring Social Media Posts About "Joker"

Unofficial Artist formally known as Diversity and Comics Yaboiposting - Posts - "Media: “Joker is going to cause an Incel revolt!”
Disney Niqqas:
'Five teenagers including 13-year-old girl arrested after 'machete' brawl during Frozen 2 viewing'"

Unofficial Artist formally known as Diversity and Comics Yaboiposting - Posts - "Media: DO NOT let your kids watch Joker
Here are some alternatives:
- Drag queen story hour
- LG*T education at 6 yrs old
- learning masturbation at 7
- Going to Pride parade at 5
- Identify as Trans at 3"
Too bad @undyingtemplar2 got banned from Twitter

Fear of a White Joker: When Did the Left Stop Caring About Crime's Root Causes? - "Todd Phillip’s Joker is one of the most culturally significant films in recent memory. It has been praised and attacked with a fervency that is rarely inspired by the mainstream fruits of Hollywood. Indeed, it is difficult to think of a modern blockbuster that has generated such attention and concern. Virtually every major media outlet has published some extended commentary on the work, whether it be a film review of the standard format (which are now rare) or an impassioned op-ed delineating how the film is either the cause or consequence of some terrible social phenomenon. Inevitably, the word “Trump” appears early and often... To progressive members of the literati, the phenomenon of interest is the omnipresent sociopathy of the white male, in all its sexual repression, social ostracization and malignant cruelty. Though nearly identical attitudes are easily found at Vice, CNN and numerous other outlets, Richard Lawson’s take in Vanity Fair exemplifies the perspective most forcefully... it is unclear why any of us should not endeavour to understand the motivations of disaffected white men (or any kind of men—for it’s not clear why Fleck’s character could not, with some small plot changes, be of any ethnic background imaginable) who end up committing acts of violence. The key to reducing violence amongst any demographic is in ascertaining the specific attributes of violent individuals. Skin colour is a crude and categorically ineffective indicator in this respect. Indeed, generations of progressives have properly argued this truth, typically in the face of racists who have alleged some particularly malign criminogenic trait at play in the minds of blacks, Hispanics, Asians, “Orientals,” Muslims or Jews. The use of a phrase such as “hideous knot” suggests that Lawson has no interest in understanding mental illness, isolation or “the culminated rage of masculine identity” (whatever that is), and that he would prefer to imagine all of these as simply being ingredients in some disgusting stew of human malignancy that is more properly called “evil.” His real complaint about the film is that, by prompting curiosity in regard to why people do bad things, it might distract audience members from the simple, morally urgent task of denouncing men such as Arthur Fleck in a purely normative manner, as a priest denounces sin... The spectacle of so many prominent writers demanding that we suppress our understanding of criminal violence, rather than nourish it, represents, at the very least, a terrible waste of journalistic talent... Fleck (played by Joaquin Phoenix) demands sympathy. (This is the fact that upsets Lawson.) As his backstory is developed, and as he is revealed to be the unlucky inheritor of an absolutely terrible deck of cards—genetically, environmentally and socioeconomically—Fleck’s descent into erratic, violent behaviour becomes easier to understand and accept. He is somebody who, through no real fault of his own, is pushed to the breaking point. This is the sort of instructive lesson in “root causes” that progressive advocates of criminal-justice reform have properly emphasized for generations. To view the Joker’s behaviour as evil, full stop, is natural: From early in life, fairy tales teach us to divide the world into good and bad. But Lawson is not a child, and Vanity Fair isn’t a book of fairy tales... it is incumbent on adult viewers—especially those who present as professional critics—to push their reflex beyond the level of pointing at the screen and saying “bad man.”... At root, our conflicted response gets to the heart of the age-old philosophical question of whether free will, good and evil can even exist in a deterministic universe. None of this has anything to do with race, except in the mind of a person who walks into a movie theater already obsessed with the question of skin colour... Fifty years ago, the place of Lawson would have been taken up by a conservative who worried that a sympathetic portrayal of a black man who lapsed into criminality might subvert the public appetite for law-and-order policies."

‘Joker’: A Cinematic Marvel, and a Statement About Society - "Of the pantheon of great cinematic psychos—from Norman Bates in Hitchcock’s “Psycho,” to Alex DeLarge in “A Clockwork Orange,” to Colonel Walter E. Kurtz in “Apocalypse Now,” to Patrick Bateman in “American Psycho”—no film does more fully to examine the entire origin of its lead character and his complete transition into a maniac the way “Joker” does... There truly are no heroes to be found in “Joker,” but there are more than enough villains. No, the film does not really sympathize with Fleck as he eventually turns to murder and unintentionally sparks a city-wide series of violent riots; but the film makes clear that if there is a true catalyst for the evil that transpires, it is the brokeness of that society as a whole... “Joker” is a film that points blame in all directions, from the richest of the rich to the poorest of the poor; everyone holds some responsibility for the degradation of society when it gets to the point where no one cares for another anymore. Those who may support the anti-elite message are angered at the equal blame that is placed on the criminals and the common people, while those who support the vilification of the angry mobs are similarly bothered by the anti-rich sentiments... For a media that profits on ratings, few things drive ratings more than magnifying the kind of partisan conflicts and socio-political divides that are currently plaguing our nation. If a message like these few lines were to be driven home to millions of Americans as effectively as they are in “Joker,” it could go a long way toward easing such tensions within our society, and the media has nothing to gain from that. And yet despite the backlash, and despite how truly disturbing and uncomfortable the film is and was intended to be, the people have spoken: “Joker” is already proving to be a smash hit, producing the biggest October opening in film history, and far exceeding box office expectations with over $200 million worldwide in its opening weekend alone... If “The Dark Knight” proved that regular people can become heroes in response to a bleak and unstable society, then “Joker” proves that regular people can become villains for the same reason."

Todd Phillips gives blunt response to Joker critics - "While it can certainly be argued that Joker is a product of the time in which it was made — as are all films, really — the flick drew its primary inspiration from the works of Martin Scorsese, in particular the 1976 classic Taxi Driver and the underrated 1983 psychodrama The King of Comedy. These films (which both happen to star Robert De Niro, who appears in Joker) are bleak, unflinching portraits of very troubled men, men who eventually resort to violence as a way of coping with slights, real and perceived, they have endured from the world at large.It should be noted that Taxi Driver is often regarded as being among the very best films ever made. When it was released, there wasn't exactly a thunderous chorus of voices wondering whether it was going to inspire a wave of psychotic loners in the vein of De Niro's Travis Bickle, who in the film is seen stalking multiple women, nearly following through with a plan to assassinate a presidential candidate, and finally engaging in what could only be termed a mass shooting... "If your kid is capable of being pushed over the edge by anything Gene Simmons has to say, you're just not doing your job as a f***in' parent."... Phillips argued that there is a distinct difference between asking an audience to identify with a character, and asking them to understand that character.The director opened his remarks by taking a not-so-subtle shot at critics who have demonized the film without even having seen it. "I really think there have been a lot of think pieces written by people who proudly state they haven't even seen the movie and they don't need to," he said. "I would just argue that you might want to watch the movie, you might want to watch it with an open mind."... Phillips also made the excellent point that complicated artworks will necessarily provoke complicated responses, and that this isn't a bad thing. To Joker's critics who wanted a more black-and-white, unambiguous take on the iconic DC villain, Phillips had some simple advice: "If you want uncomplicated art, you might want to take up calligraphy, but filmmaking will always be a complicated art." Phoenix then chimed in to take issue with the notion that any artwork could be directly blamed for the behavior of an individual, an argument that is painfully familiar to anybody who has ever been a fan of rap music or video games. "I think that, for most of us, you're able to tell the difference between right and wrong," Phoenix said. "And those that aren't are capable of interpreting anything in the way that they may want to. People misinterpret lyrics from songs. They misinterpret passages from books. So I don't think it's the responsibility of a filmmaker to teach the audience morality or the difference between right or wrong. I mean, to me, I think that that's obvious." The star then questioned whether it should be the burden of the artist — be they filmmaker, video game programmer, or musician — to take into consideration every possible effect that their work might have on any given individual. "I think if you have somebody that has that level of emotional disturbance, they can find fuel anywhere. I just don't think that you can function that way," he said. "The truth is [that] you don't know what is going to be the fuel for somebody. And it might very well be your question. It might be this moment, right? But you can't function in life saying, 'Well, I can't ask that question for the small chance that somebody might be affected'… I wouldn't ask you to do that.""

Matt Binder on Twitter - "beginning of october: the joker movie is going to cause mass shootings
end of october: the joker movie is gentrifying a staircase"

‘Joker’ Will Top $900 Million As Biggest R-Rated Film In History
The SJWs failed to stop this film. Looks like going against the SJW crowd earns you more money than kowtowing to them

Box Office: ‘Joker’ Becomes The Most Profitable Comic Book Movie Ever - "it will have a new global cume of around $957 million by tonight. That will be 15.3x its $62.5 million production budget, which will make the Todd Phillips-directed and Joaquin Phoenix-starring drama more profitable, in terms of budget versus global gross, than Jim Carrey’s The Mask ($351 million on a $23 million budget in 1994)... In a skewed way, Joker represents every studio’s dream, in that it’s a mid-budget, 2-D title that’s pulling top-tier blockbuster business without relying on China... When it tops $1 billion worldwide in the next week or so, it’ll be the cheapest movie to do so, with a budget just under the $63 million spent by Jurassic Park back in 1993."

As a psychiatrist, I was blown away by the latest Joker - "The film poses an important question vocalised in no uncertain terms by the Joker at its climax. "What do you get when you cross a mentally ill loner with a society that abandons him and treats him like trash? ... You get what you f---in’ deserve," he proclaims as he murders the talk show host before him... The Joker (or Arthur) appears to have a complex mix of diagnoses, including pseudobulbar affect – a rare condition consisting of uncontrollable laugher or crying, and possibly a psychotic illness, evidenced by his apparent hallucinations about the subject of his affections (played by Zazie Beetz). In addition, he displays features of certain personality traits that are not technically considered to be mental illnesses – psychopathy (he feels no empathy for the victims of his violence) and narcissism (which makes him crave attention and adulation by any means necessary).Phillips has clearly done his research and illustrates the path to the development of these conditions elegantly. We are told Arthur suffered early life trauma – horrific abuse as a child at the hands of his mother’s partner including head injury, which is a risk factor for serious mental illness including pseudobulbar affect. He also has a family history – his mother has delusional disorder and narcissistic personality disorder, and he experienced abandonment as a child and the absence of a father figure, which can predispose to certain psychiatric conditions... We are not laughing at Arthur nor distancing ourselves from him; instead we are forced to empathise with the protagonist... some mental illnesses can at times make people do tragic, awful things because they are scared, paranoid or desperate. But what are we going to do about it? Fund services that can help and treat them with sympathy and respect, or deprive them of assistance, discriminate against them and leave them and others to suffer the consequences?"