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Joaquin Phoenix’s second act in “Gotham Bombs”

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Joaquin Phoenix’s second act in “Gotham Bombs”

Joker: Folie à Deux opens in theaters on Friday, October 4. This review is based on a screening at the 81st Venice International Film Festival.

Joker: Folie à Deux takes a fresh approach to DC’s most famous villain, but soon falls into a rote rhythm. advertised as a dreamy jukebox musical, the sequel to 2019 joker is really more of a courtroom drama, and not a particularly interesting one at that. The film works best when it seeks out new ways of looking at its main character – often through the eyes of a wonderfully portrayed Harley Quinn, played by Lady Gaga – but it too often insists on returning to familiar territory (and occasionally familiar footage) rather than forging a new path.

Arkham Asylum is now home to Joker/Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix), whose daily routine consists of being woken up by gruff prison guards who demand that he tell jokes while he empties his latrine. It seems Arthur doesn’t talk much anymore – he certainly doesn’t smile anymore – and director Todd Phillips, with the help of cinematographer Lawrence Sher, captures this mechanical morning trial in long, unbroken takes that draw the viewer into Joker’s sordid world. As he awaits trial, his lawyer Maryanne Stewart (Catherine Keener) insists that he plead insanity, concluding that the best defense is to treat “Joker” and “Arthur” as separate personalities inhabiting the same body.

Arthur, like most people around him, knows that this is more of a legal strategy than anything resembling the truth, but the question of how his assumed personality changes him is a constant looming question. On the one hand, it might make it easier for him to separate Joker’s actions from Arthur’s (and portray them as a response to trauma). On the other hand, when he catches the eye of fellow patient and avowed admirer Harleen “Lee” Quinzel, it seems as though Joker is who he wants to be and needs to be.

Because the two meet during music therapy, real and invented songs are scattered throughout Folie à Deux’s running time. These familiar Hollywood songs and classic pop hits are sung passionately by Phoenix and Gaga, and some are even mixed with Hildur Guðnadóttir’s eerie, droning score. The duo initially bond through song. They match each other’s craziness—the shared madness and delusion of the subtitle, what the French call “folie à deux”—but much of that is sidelined during the film’s lengthy courtroom scenes, which promise chaos as Arthur begins representing himself. Unfortunately, the delirium isn’t quite conveyed by Phoenix, who smears himself in makeup to play both lawyer and defendant.

After a first hour set entirely within the walls of Arkham, the sequel becomes a kind of referendum on the first Joker, though not in a meaningful, transformative way. Rather, it’s just an extension of the first film’s plot in the most ponderous and literal way possible. For a film almost entirely freed from its comic book source material, Joker: Folie à Deux is oddly constrained by its own predecessor. Recurring characters pop up to recount events we’ve already seen, while Stewart asks leading questions about how Joker feels like a separate entity from Arthur. The DA, on the other hand, is a slick Harvey Dent (Harry Lawtey)—the villainous Two-Face from the comics—who’s always a pleasure to watch, even though his reasoning sheds little light on Arthur’s actions or state of mind.

Perhaps the most prominent element of this extended section is Gary (Leigh Gill), Arthur’s clown colleague from the first film, whose short stature almost becomes the subject of Arthur’s comedic remarks as he takes the stand. If the sequel comes close to making an actual point about Joker—namely, personhood and identity—it’s that the coping mechanism that protects Arthur from the cruelty of the world makes him cruel in turn. Like many strong ideas that Folie à Deux addresses, however, this one is soon discarded. Likewise, Arthur’s upbringing and his abusive mother, detailed in Joker, are rehashed ad nauseam, while the subject of Arthur’s future with Lee (which could potentially involve a family) is quickly dropped before it can offer any kind of thematic reflection.

Folie à Deux too often insists on returning to familiar territory rather than breaking new ground.

This is the sequel’s standard method, which makes it a frustrating experience beyond the first, Arkham-focused hour. At first, it creates a more careful and methodical aesthetic than Joker – every scene is carefully composed; every methodical interlude has a clear emotional intent – but as it progresses, it does little with its camera that is worth commenting on. A few dreamlike flourishes occur, though mostly to cite the familiar visual elements of other musicals, like Jacques Demy’s French Nouvelle Vague landmark. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg and Francis Ford Coppola’s sincere, expressionistic film “One from the Heart.”

Aside from these scattered references, Phillips’ expressionism is limited to making every environment and light source look somewhat like a bright spotlight on a stage, silhouetting the Joker and Lee until they are defined by their shape – their iconography. It’s a great idea in theory, and taps into the acting aspect associated with the Joker character, but it barely develops further, either visually or conceptually. It’s just one of several things that ultimately keep the character in a state of rigidity, to the point that a crucial emotional twist in the second half that sets the direction of the film comes completely out of the blue. It’s one movie, and then suddenly it’s another.

Still, Phoenix clearly knows this character inside and out by now. His posture is even more disturbing this time around; the actor is still alarmingly gaunt, but his stance speaks to a body that has endured a lifetime of abuse (something as simple as uneven shoulders can go a long way). When Arthur decides to embrace the “Joker” part of himself, that posture changes, almost locking itself in place as Phoenix sprawls luxuriantly, comfortably, and confidently across the screen—usually with a cigarette in hand. However, he never loses Arthur’s innate silliness, even as he puts on that facade. As the Joker slips between forms of portrayal, his accent slips back and forth too, from British to American Southern and back again, as if he can’t quite figure out who (or what) he wants to be.

But if Joker: Folie à Deux has a not-so-secret weapon, it’s Lady Gaga’s take on Harley Quinn, whose fascination with Arthur forms the very basis of the film. It’s a shame the film never really allows its musical elements to flourish (the energy of these segments doesn’t stretch that far), because giving Gaga the chance to run the emotional and sonic gamut would likely have resulted in one of modern Hollywood’s greatest acting performances. She even modulates her singing voice between the real Lee (an amateur singer who sings with uneven passion) and Arthur’s imagined version of her, whose singing is more, well, Gaga-like. Unfortunately, she’s limited by subtle delivery in a film that’s anything but that.

The careful tightrope walk Gaga walks between adoration and mania is absolutely rewarding, and at times lets a commentary on fandom obsession slip into the film. (Lee is practically a Manson girl.) In true Phillips fashion, however, this idea never really comes to fruition. Before it does, Joker: Folie à Deux changes direction again. Not to mention the film’s fascinating Oedipal undercurrent, which depicts Arthur’s desire for adoration as a response to a lack of maternal warmth; there are no prizes for guessing how far this goes.

Though politically scattered and aping other, better filmmakers, “Joker” at least had unifying visual and thematic motifs. It felt complete, if cobbled together. “Joker: Folie à Deux” deviates from that approach — initially for better, but later for worse. Its more considered framework and character dynamics set the stage for a musical romance that never blossoms — visually, aurally, emotionally — giving way to a sequel that is entirely weighed down by its predecessor, even as it tries very hard to escape its orbit.

Correction: The original version of this review incorrectly stated that “Gonna Build a Mountain” was written for Joker: Folie à Deux. All of the songs sung onscreen by Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga predate the film.

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