Good or Bad Joke? Joaquin Phoenix as the Joker

By Ammar Haziq  •  27 Sep 2018 in Pop Culture

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Earlier this week, fan boys and girls alike lost their minds when director Todd Phillips posted a teaser/BTS video of Joaquin Phoenix as the Joker. It’s not exactly your traditional Joker makeup, and especially not over the top like Leto’s Marilyn Manson-esque version.

The video starts with a clapperboard and zooms slowly into Arthur Fleck, the character that Phoenix is playing in the movie. As it starts to zoom in further, we see flashes of a clown/Joker with The Guess Who’s ‘Laughing’ playing, and at the end of the video, we get a reveal of Joaquin Phoenix as the Joker. Or is it?

 

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Camera test (w/ sound). Joker.

A post shared by Todd Phillips (@toddphillips1) on Sep 21, 2018 at 10:00am PDT

There’s also a few “leaked” high quality photos of the Joker in all its glory. Honestly, I dig the clown makeup and from my understanding, that’s not the Joker’s final look in the film. It’s supposed to portray this sad man whose life is spiralling into chaos, thus becoming the Clown Prince of Crime and Batman’s soulmate.

Though a lot of people dig the makeup–as always there are going to be people who just shit on everything because it’s cool to shit on everything nowadays to put it Bojack. I think most people missed the point of the film’s plot, it’s supposed to be an origin, a cautionary tale of a washed up man who doesn’t care anymore. We’re not supposed to get the Joker until a Batman exists.

Even if the film does use this make up as its final look, I don’t care. I dig it. It’s fresh and it feels like a mix between Caesar Romero’s and Heath Ledger’s Jokers, and the clown makeup does give off a sinister vibe. How many traditional Joker makeup do people need? There are hundreds of iterations out there. Just pick one and move on.

And come on, anything that Joaquin Phoenix plays, he’s going to crush it. Sure, Leto had big clown shoes to fill in and it was… well, it was Leto. Phoenix has an advantage here, I like the tone that the film is going for and I’m excited to see how Phoenix embodies Puddin’.

Joker comes laughing into theatres 2019. Need a dose of pop culture? Keep it here at JUICE.