In 2008’s “The Dark Knight,” Heath Ledger’s Joker preached that the people in charge of Gotham City shouldn’t be afraid to “introduce a little anarchy” into their world.
The citizens didn’t that time around, but it’s a sentiment that Joaquin Phoenix’s sad-sack villain seemed to take to heart for the next iteration of the character, in Todd Phillips’ polarizing 2019 film “Joker.” Phoenix’s take on the Clown Prince of Crime is a far cry from anything DC fans had seen on screen before, as Phillips made the movie by pulling as much from the works of Paul Schrader and Martin Scorsese as he did from the superhero comics oeuvre.With an R-rating, a Venice Film Festival release, and the promise of a standalone story, “Joker” arrived on the scene with a veneer of unusual prestige for a comic book movie.
It also immediately divided fans and audiences, thanks in…
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