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‘A cinematic achievement on a high level’: First review of Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker is here, and it’s glowing
Toronto International Film Festival artistic director Cameron Bailey has offered a glowing review of the upcoming Batman spin-off film, Joker, starring Joaquin Phoenix.
Days ahead of its grand premiere at the Venice International Film Festival, and subsequently at the Toronto International Film Festival, we’ve got our first piece of opinion about Joaquin Phoenix’s upcoming Joker film, from someone who’s seen it.
TIFF artistic director Cameron Bailey has said in an interview that the film is ‘terrific’ and has noted its cinematic achievements and ‘great ambition’. “First of all it’s terrific. So it should play on our largest stage. But it’s a really original take on comic book movies and on the Joker character in particular,” Bailey told the Toronto Sun. “It’s not based on an existing story, it has one of the greatest actors in modern cinema, Joaquin Phoenix, in the lead, and Robert De Niro is in it as well, one of the best actors that has ever lived.”
Bailey added, “But it has an interesting tone and approach to it. It’s set in the late ‘70s, early ‘80s and it feels like it was made then. It’s gritty in its look. It has references to Martin Scorsese’s filmmaking and it feels like a cinematic achievement on a high level. Although it’s working with very populist material, it has great ambition.”
The Toronto International Film Festival has long been recognised as being a very accurate predictor for the Oscars, with several of its films going on to win big at the Academy Awards. In 2018, TIFF selection Green Book went on to win the Best Picture award. On Wednesday, Warner Bros released the final trailer for the movie. Fans have reacted enthusiastically to the trailer, with many even calling for an Oscar nomination of Phoenix, who has been nominated thrice already.
Director Todd Phillips has previously said that the film will not draw directly from the DC Comics, but will instead tell an original story. “We didn’t follow anything from the comic books, which people are gonna be mad about,” Phillips told Empire. “We just wrote our own version of where a guy like Joker might come from. That’s what was interesting to me. We’re not even doing Joker, but the story of becoming Joker. It’s about this man.”
Joker also stars Robert De Niro, Zazie Beetz, Frances Conroy, Mark Maron and Brett Cullen. The film is slated for an October 4 release.
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