(Bloomberg) -- I did not like 2019’s Joker, Todd Phillips’ film about the Batman villain that won Joaquin Phoenix an Oscar. I found it self important yet shockingly hollow in its attempts to say something about how society warps the lonely. And yet I’ll admit I was excited for its sequel Joker: Folie à Deux. It’s a musical co-starring Lady Gaga. How bad could it be, really?
Turns out: Very bad.
Folie à Deux is a punishingly dull affair. It’s a pointless sequel with very little plot. It wastes the talent on screen, and it squanders the genuinely intriguing conceit of its characters breaking into song. Those musical sequences, of which I had such high hopes, are lacking in creativity and fail to justify their own existence. But they’re still better than the rest of the movie, which is filled with endless dialogue that simply rehashes the events of the first movie.
If Joker was implicitly influenced by Taxi Driver—I said it was self-important—Folie à Deux announces its references right out of the gate in a Looney Tunes-inspired animated sequence in which a cartoon Joker fights with his own shadow. In the background of these scenes you can see posters for classic Hollywood musicals Sweet Charity, The Band Wagon and Pal Joey, all a preview of the soundtrack to come.
This opening is perhaps the most inspired moment of the whole film, introducing a new visual language that is quickly discarded when the animation gives way to the dour live action version of Arkham Asylum where Phoenix’s Arthur Fleck is imprisoned. He is awaiting trial for the five murders he committed the last time we saw him. (He actually killed a sixth person, his mother, but no one knows about that yet.)
In the grim institution, he’s mocked by the guards who shepherd him to meetings with his altruistic lawyer played by Catherine Keener. She thinks she can spare him the death penalty by proving that her client has a separate, split personality from Joker, the killer. Good luck, girl.
In these early scenes, Phoenix’s Arthur is a hollow shell with deadened eyes. But he perks up when he is allowed to attend a music class in another, less severe, ward of Arkham. That’s where he meets Lee, played by Gaga, as the inmates sing “Get Happy,” a tune most associated with Judy Garland.
Lee, of course, is this universe’s version of Harley Quinn, most famously portrayed by Margot Robbie in the Suicide Squad movies as a chirpy antihero. Gaga makes Lee a sullen, sultry creature who is obsessed with Joker, wooing him with tales of her own hardscrabble upbringing. During movie night—where the crowd is watching Fred Astaire in The Band Wagon, naturally—she sets a piano on fire and they dance and sing among the chaos.
But then Lee leaves Arkham just as Arthur is about to go to trial. She promises to be in the courtroom to support him while she prepares a life for them on the outside. He’s smitten. Her motives are a little more suspect.
Alas, there’s not much more to that relationship considering the rest of the movie is spent on the legal proceedings which mostly feel like an excuse to remind the audience of everything that happened in the previous installment of this saga. Familiar faces take to the stand and recount their versions of events. Occasionally, there are pauses for some singing, most of which takes place inside of Arthur’s head, but sometimes happens diegetically, like when Lee decides to serenade him with Burt Bacharach’s “Close to You.”
The film itself seems embarrassed by its musical elements, never willing to fully commit to the endeavor. The fantasy sequences, despite some excellent production design that turns Gaga and Phoenix into Gotham City incarnations of Cher and Sonny, are staged listlessly and feel extraneous. Meanwhile, when these love birds sing in the context of the actual narrative, they do so in strained voices, as if to further prove how disturbed these people truly are. (Gaga only releases her full belt a couple of times—a true shame.)
I began to get the suspicion that Phillips believes the only people who really love musicals are lunatics—and his disdain for both categories is palpable. Arthur’s mental health is treated carelessly, with physical and psychological abuse blithely used as a talking point. Through all of this, Phoenix adds no new dimensions to the character. He still looks emaciated, and he brings an intensity to Arthur’s mania, but we learn nothing new about this man who we’re either supposed to pity or fear.
Gaga livens things up with a volatile swagger whenever she’s on screen, and yet she’s hindered by the fact that the character is brutally underwritten. Her only personality is her attraction to Joker. Beyond that she’s a blank slate with some great eye makeup.
As Folie à Deux creeps toward its underwhelming yet also laughable finish you can’t help but wonder how this all went so wrong. The trial is meaningless, the romance is half-hearted and the musical bits, starring Lady Gaga no less, have no pizzazz. It all feels like, well, a cruel joke.
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