Joker: Folie e Deux (2024) Review

Joaquin Phoenix reprising his Oscar-winning role and the addition of Lady Gaga, what’s not to love?

After the success of Todd Phillips’ first Joker in 2019, the sequel, Joker: Folie e Deux, was always going to come with outrageously high expectations, especially when you add Lady Gaga to the cast.

Unfortunately, it didn’t meet those lofty expectations and honestly didn’t even come close. The sequel is still a dark look at the twisted mind of Joaquin Phoenix’s version of The Joker but nothing really happens in this movie. The acting from both leads is solid, but is let down by a boring and uneventful script as well as the random addition of songs.

The musical aspect of the storyline had potential, a lot of it, but underutilised as it was, it fell flat. The musical numbers sometimes seemed to be in reality and at other times, a fantasy. Expanding the fantasy or the split personality idea of this particular Joker could have helped the musical numbers. Similar to Rob Marshall’s Chicago (2002), the dull and dark world of Arthur Fleck’s real world, set against the bright and musical world of Joker would have fit And if the movie was overall a discussion of his duelling personalities, then couldn’t this have added impact to that? An exaggerated way of saying that The Joker is always putting on a performance? I guess we’ll never know.

The acting performances are probably the highlight, even if Lady Gaga does seem to be playing herself at times. The look of the movie is what you’d expect and the sound and music do their job, but it’s easy to overlook the positives of the film when you’re sitting in a cinema wondering what is going on and why The Joker is randomly breaking into song.

Brett

For more chat about what we watched in November, check out the full podcast episode.