Smile and put on a happy face.

The Joker officially released worldwide on Friday, October 4, 2019

The Joker directed by Todd Phillips

The official run time is 2 hours and 2 minutes

The official synopsis of the film according to Google.com states as follows

“Forever alone in a crowd, failed comedian Arthur Fleck seeks connection as he walks the streets of Gotham City. Arthur wears two masks — the one he paints for his day job as a clown, and the guise he projects in a futile attempt to feel like he’s part of the world around him. Isolated, bullied and disregarded by society, Fleck begins a slow descent into madness as he transforms into the criminal mastermind known as the Joker.”

WARNING: THE FOLLOWING CONTAINS HEAVY SPOILERS FOR JOKER.

The film starts out showing a beat down Gotham City. Trash filling the streets and smoke clogging the sky. Gotham is in despair and so is Arthur Flek. We fist see Flek at his job applying clown makeup on his face before he started his shift. Arthur seems to be very upset with a tear dripping down his face. He then forces a smile on his face with his hands while he looks into the mirror.

The next scene in the film shows Arthur doing his job. He is standing outside holding a sign for a store going out of business dressed up as a clown. He is waving and spinning it around when a group of kids steal his sign and start running with it. Arthur starts to chase them when they run into a dark alleyway. The kids beat the sign over Arthur’s head and start to beat him up. Arthur is then left in the alleyway beaten and bruised.

The next scene shows Arthur going home later that night to his beat down apartment where he lives with his terminally ill mother. His mother asks him how his day was and explained to her how he got jumped. She tells him everything will be ok and gives him a hug, like how every mother should. Arthur then turns on the tv to watch his favorite late-night comedy show, the Murry Franklin show.

This is where things get confusing to some viewers.

This follow up scene shows Arthur actually sitting in the crowd for on of Murry Franklin’s show. Murry tells a joke and then Arthur laughs with the iconic Joker laugh. When the crowd is quiet, Flek screams “I love you Murry!” Murry then looks into the crowd to see who screamed that and Arthur stood up and said it was him. Murry rhen tells Arthur to come down onto the stage and tell the audience his life story. Flek tells the audience and the TV viewers that his mother always tells him to put on a happy face. He also says his mother tells him his purpose in life is to spread happiness in joy throughout the world. The show cuts to commercial break and Murry tells Arthur that his story is great and gives him a hug. The next frame of the scene shows Arthur back at home watching the Murry Franklin Show on TV.

This scene can be very confusing for some viewers. Arthur was never on the Murry Franklin Show. He was imagining he was there in the crowd. Sometimes when people have mental health disabilities, they have a certain condition where they imagine themselves places where they are not. For example this scene, Arthur was never there.

Following that scene Arthur is at Archam State Hospital where he meets his therapist once a week to discuss his medication as well as his daily struggles. He breaks out in his iconic laugh, which is another condition Arthur possesses. It is a condition where the person cannot stop laughing and the laughing does not connect to his actual feelings. This laugh will be a major plot point for the rest of the film. When Flek stops laughing he asks his therapist for more medication because he had ran out of his daily medication.

The next morning after his therapist visit, Arthur is back at work working at HA HA’S. He is in the locker room talking to his fellow employees about when he was jumped by the group of kids. The viewer can notice a very big bruise along his back from the attack in this scene. One of his co-workers pulls him aside and tells him he needs to protect himself. He hands him a revolver with 15 bullets in a brown bag and tells him to carry the pistol with him at all times.

Later that night Arthur is at home playing with the gun as it was a toy. He pretends people are sitting on his couch and he is shooting at them. Arthur then gets up and starts to dance around by himself in his living room with the gun in his hand. On accident, he fires the gun and shoots a hole into the wall. His mom, who is in her bedroom asks what is going on in the living room and he tells her he is watching a war movie and pretends to lower the volume on the TV.

The next morning comes back around and Arthur is seeing his therapist for the very last time. She tells him the state has cut the funding for the program in the state and she is leaving her office in the next week. Arthur does not like this news at all. He tells her that she don’t listen to him anyways and she just asks him the same questions every week. She was no help to him at all except when it came to getting his medication that he won’t be getting anymore.

Arthur then gets on the train to head to work where he has a gig today. A little boy in the seat looks back at him then Arthur jokes around making funny faces. The mother of the son looks back at Arthur and tells him to stop messing around with her kid. He says he is sorry to her then breaks out in his laugh. The woman looks at him as he was a psychopath. While laughing, Arthur takes out a laminated notecard from his pocket and hands it to the lady. On the notecard, it states he has a mental health disorder that makes him laugh and that the laugh doesn’t actually reflect his actual feelings.

Arthur is now at work. For today’s gig, Arthur will be going to a hospital where terminally ill kids are being treated for life-threatening diseases. We see Arthur dressed as a doctor clown dancing along with the kids in this big room. While dancing, Arthur stumbles and the gun that his co-worker gave him falls out of his pocket. The doctors and kids in the room are all in disbelief. Arthur tells them it is just a prop for his act but the real doctors in the room do not believe him.

On his way home for the gig, Arthur gets a call from his boss telling him that he is fired for his actions at the hospital. He tells Arthur that he is a psychopath and hangs up the phone.

This is the turning point in the film where Arthur’s life goes for a tragic turn.

While taking a train on the way home. We see Arthur is very sad and starts to cry. He then sees 3 employees of Wayne trying to hit on a young lady. The lady throws a punch at the one man and leaves the train. Arthur then begins to laugh at the 3 men and they don’t take it kindly. They then ask Arthur what is funny and start to beat him up. Out of defense, Arthur takes out the gun he was given and kills all 3 of the Wayne employees.

Arthur then runs into a bathroom after he gets off the train. He then looks in the mirror and starts to do a cryptic dance in the bathroom

The next morning, Arthur is at his workplace cleaning out his locker after previously being fired. All of his ex-employees look at him very weirdly. They all ask him why he did what he did and then goes to blame the guy who gave him the gun outright. On his way out he sees a sign on the wall that says “Always Smile” Arthur gets a marker and scribbles out the word “Always” and then replaces it with “Never” so now the sign reads “Never Smile”

Arthur goes back home to his mother writing to Bruce Wayne. She is writing to him because she wants him to give them money so they can move out of their apartment which is falling apart. Arthur then begins to dance with his mom in the living room before she goes to sleep. Arthur then takes his mother to bed and secretly opens the letter she wrote to Mr. Wayne. In the note, she recognizes Arthur as her and Mr. Wayne’s son. Arthur is in complete disbelief. He barges into the room where his mother is sleeping and demands an answer. He is visually very upset and makes his mom have a stroke. She now goes into the hospital. When sitting in the hospital room, he turns on the Murry Franklin show. All of a sudden there is a video appearing on the show of Arthur doing stand up comedy at the club. Arthur’s jokes don’t go over well with the crowd and Murry Franklin makes fun of him. While sitting outside smoking a cigarette, the Gotham police ask him a few questions about the murders on the train. The police realize the gun that killed the 3 guys is the same type Arthur had at the hospital hours before he was fired.

The next day comes around and Arthur goes to the town hall in hopes to talk to Thomas Wayne, his apparent father. Outside the town hall, there are riots occurring and Arthur loves it. Arthur loves all of the attention that he is secretly getting for killing 3 of Thomas Wayne’s employees. While the police fight with the riots Arthur secretly hops over the barricade and heads into the town hall where all the rich people are. They are there to watch the symphony perform. While searching through the crowd, Arthur sees Thomas Wayne getting up. He started to follow him until they both met in the bathroom. Arthur pleas his case and tells Thomas that he is his father. Thomas says that he is not his father and he was adopted. Arthur starts to laugh in disbelief. He believes Thomas is lying to him. Thomas asks if it’s funny and punches Arthur in the face. Arthur then goes home and stuffs himself in the refrigerator to hide away from society.

The next day Arthur goes to the Arkham State Hospital to view his mother’s health records. He is going in hopes to see if Thomas Wayne was really telling the truth and Arthur really is adopted. Arthur goes up to the security desk to meet the guard there and asks for the health records. The guard refuses to give him the records without his mom’s signature. He then goes into a tug of war over the files and bashes his head off the chain link. Arthur got ahold of the records and started to run away with them into the bathroom. Arthur opens the documents and finds out that he is really adopted after all. Arthur is devastated and goes home to lock himself in the refrigerator.

The next day Arthur wakes up and gets a call. The call is from the Murry Franklin show. They called and ask him if he wanted to be on the show. Arthur is in disbelief and gladly agrees to be on the show. After he gets dressed he heads out to the hospital to visit his mother who is dying. He is sitting there listening to his mother’s heartbeat getting slower and slower. He gets up to confront his “mother” about being adopted. He gets a pillow and strangles his “mother” to death.

The next morning comes around and Arthur is back home alone. He is getting ready to go onto the Murry Franklin Show. He starts to dye his hair green and put on his makeup. There is a knock on the door and it is his ex-coworkers from HA-HA’S. They went there to ask Arthur if he was ok after his “mothers” passing. The two coworkers that went to go see him are the one who gave him the gun and the midget. Out of nowhere Arthur gets a pair of scissors and stabs the guy who gave him the gun to death. The midget is in utter disbelief of what he is seeing. He believes Arthur will kill him next and is in fear. Arthur said he will not hurt him because he was the only person ever nice to him. He lets him go.

In the next scene we see the Joker in full out. He has the iconic hair and makeup now as well as a nice red suit. He is starting to make his way to the Murry Franklin Show. While dancing in the roads the police start to chase him. They chase him into the train and the protestors begin to beat the police to death.

Arthur is now backstage at the Murry Frankln Show. Murry meets Joker backstage and was questioning his look. He asked if his look had anything to do with politics and Joker denied that it did. Arthur asked Murry to call him the Joker when he is introduced on TV.

Murry introduces Arthur as the Joker and he goes to sit down. Murry instantly starts to make fun of him and Joker starts to laugh uncontrollably. Joker admitted to killing those 3 young men on the train a few nights prior. Joker calls Murry a terrible person and shoots and kills him right on the spot. The audience starts to scream and run away. The Joker gets up and shoots Murry’s lifeless body one more time. He goes to the camera and puts his face right in the middle of the view and says “Goodnight, and always remember” the camera goes offline.

The next scene shows Arthur riding in the back of the police car after being arrested. He is looking out at all the protestors that are praising his actions as he drives by. Out of nowhere, an ambulance drives right into the cop car killing the 2 policemen and severely injuring Arthur. The person that is driving the ambulance gets out of the car and pulls Arthur out of the cop car and lays him on the hood. The person that pulled him out was a supporter of Arthur and was wearing a clown mask.

Meanwhile, on the other side of town, riots are still going on as the Wayne family is coming out of the theater after watching a movie. They are walking down a dark alleyway and a rioter pulls them aside killing Thomas and Martha Wayne. Bruce Waye, young Batman, sits there looking at their lifeless corpse.

Meanwhile, on the other side of town, Arthur wakes up on the hood of the cop car and starts to dance. Then he realizes his mouth is bleeding and takes the blood and puts a smile on his face. The crowd of people cheer.

In the last scene of the film we see Arthur back in a mental asylum laughing while his therapist is talking to him. He laughs at the fact that the Waynes are dead. The therapist asks why he is laughing and he says she wouldn’t understand why he is laughing. Arthur kills his therapist and runs out of the room trying to escape.

THE END

MY OPINION

My opinion of this film is that I absolutely love it. The way they depicted the Joker in this rendition is perfect. I love the way they built up his insanity until he couldn’t take life anymore. I highly recommend this film for anyone who likes a good antihero film. I hope we get to see more of this character in the future because there is still a lot of things to discover about Arthur Flek.

What are your opinions of Joker? Did you like it why or why not? Sound off in the comment section below.