“Joker: Folie à Deux” premiered Oct. 4, and to put it simply: no one saw it.
Domestically, the movie made about $38.7 million on opening weekend, which is disappointing, to say the least. Since then, revenue has failed to meet expectations.
With Joaquin Phoenix reprising his role as Joker and Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn, there is plenty of potential for success. Alas, just because the ingredients are there doesn’t mean the chef knows how to cook.
Besides being a box office black hole, the film completely disrespects what was built in its predecessor.
To call “Folie à Deux” a movie is even a bit of a stretch. In fact, based purely on marketing materials, there’s little reason to believe that you walked into a musical.
The music is good — this is Gaga we’re on about — but the numbers don’t fit into the narrative. Sure, it’s used to separate Arthur Fleck’s thoughts from reality, which is an interesting delivery of an overdone idea. The issue is that the story is weak as it stands, and additional, frankly meaningless, bloat creates enough disconnect to be a net negative.
The writing is entirely at fault. Todd Phillips, understandably, had no inspiration for a sequel. “Joker” (2019) was meant to be a one-off piece, but it made such stupendous money that Warner wrote Phillips a fat check to do his thing.
The thing he decided to do was recess Joker as a character. A lot of “Folie à Deux” simultaneously recaps the first movie while trying to force guilt onto Fleck as he navigates life in prison. Think back to “Joker” — where is the regret in that portrayal of Fleck?
In the same vein, there is no Joker in this film. If anything, this is a better Harley Quinn origin story. Joker takes a backseat as they focus on developing Fleck and his relationships, except nothing changes. The movie starts and ends in the same place, literally.
The ending itself drops your jaw to the floor, derogatorily. The attempt at a Heath Ledger Joker moment is gross, and one final display of Phillips’ air-headed writing.
All of these factors join forces to make a joke out of what “Joker” had established. On the bright side, all those Warner execs learned a very valuable lesson about the art of movies.
“Folie à Deux” is just another uninspired, failed sequel. Thanks, Hollywood.
