It’s not the same therapist. IMDB lists 2 different actors - Sharon Washington for the social worker, April Grace for the Arkham therapist.
Hmmm… Could’ve sworn she was the same one.
Either way, I think it’s up to us to decide when he got to Arkham. I don’t think there was a shooting of Murray or a riot that praised him afterwards. I think he was already there, but not sure for how long.
It’s not the same therapist. I distinctly remember.
Am I the only person who found this movie to be pretentious?
I didn’t find it so, but I’m interested in why you found it to be. Did it seem “too arty” to you?
It seemed like it had something to say, And it did touch upon a lot of things but it never committed to one of them. What are Joker’s motives at the end? He says it’s not political. He just wants to watch the world burn? If it’s about class, say it’s about class.
I think it’s silly that three rando killings has the type of reaction it did.
His comedy clip showed up on a talk show that he’s always wanted to be on, and then he’s actually invited on? What luck.
I liked the trailers. 
I think it was a deliberate ploy to have 2 similarly looking women at opposite ends of the film. Unless you’re very good with faces, you’re going to be unsure if it was the same woman, and with a theatrical release you can’t go back and check. The confusion about the therapist is just one more way the film is messing with your narrative perception.
Also - he’s allowed to go on and say distasteful jokes and admit to killing 3 people and security isn’t all over him.
They just chat about it?
Why is this connected to Batman?
Phoenix was excellent though.
That was entertaining but wow was it bleak but I guess that is what you are signing up for with a movie called Joker.
I loved the 70s movie vibe but I really wish there was a hopeful parallel story because it was almost too much to bear.
One thing I haven’t seen mentioned is that as Joker is being arrested and driven through the ensuing carnage in Gotham, Cream’s ‘White Room’ is playing—and in the Arkham scenes, he’s in a literal white room.
But in the end, I don’t think there’s a single answer to what was real and what wasn’t in the movie—and I think one can plausibly argue that that’s the whole point: in the age of Trumpism, truth has become secondary to narrative; things aren’t about what actually happened anymore, but about who can make their particular narrative stick. ‘Decoding’ Joker is the entirely wrong approach—there’s no ‘there’ there, and that’s all the ‘there’ there is.
Good catch! This prompted me to take a look at the soundtrack list. I was so immersed in this film that I didn’t remember any of the music until I looked it up. Another great facet of this movie.
That is a good catch. Adds to the theory that the entire riot scene only happened inside his own head.
BTW, since we’re talking about music I found that Gary Glitter actually won’t get any money from the use of “Rock and Roll Part 2”. He sold off the music rights a long time ago.
The wife and I saw it, and really enjoyed it. I will definitely have to watch it again, probably a few times, before I’m satisfied I understand it.
I did laugh out loud when young Master Wayne, after deciding to engage with the titular character, exited his fort by sliding down a pole.
I’d love more movies set in this world. I’d like to see a Riddler or Victor Zsasz who were inspired by the Joker.
Or a Batman movie. The Joker in this movie is a human, not a supervillain, so I’d like to see a more realistic Batman origins movie in which he’s not a superhero, but rather a slightly odd human. Instead of driving a car like this, he would drive a car like [del]this[/del] this, something that he could soup up himself in the garage of his mansion.
SNL skit: Captain Shadow and the Cardinal.
Also, I thought it a bit unbelievable, while watching the movie, that the Joker had a girlfriend, but I presume that was all fantasy - the bits where he wasn’t stalking her and sitting in her apartment, anyway.
They literally show in the movie that his whole relationship with Sophie was in his head and did not really exist.
Wow, this was a really good movie. Just saw it tonight with my wife and both of us agreed it was really good.
In fact, I think it is going to end up in my top 5 for 2019. This was a huge surprise for me. I was totally drawn in to the character and his struggles. I knew he would become “the Joker” or something like that, but I actually found myself feeling really bad for him.
I know the Oscars are unimportant and never reflect the best, but I do hope Joaquin Phoenix gets one for this portrayal. This whole movie depended on him and he really delivered.
I thought it was great, and not just for Phoenix’s acting.
Has anyone mentioned all the links/references to the 1983 Scorsese film The King of Comedy? In Joker, DeNiro basically plays the Jerry Lewis role, and Arthur is a version of DeNiro’s unforgettably pathetic Rupert Pupkin character.
ETA: I see Unreconstructed Man (and possibly others) did already allude to the Scorsese connections.
The cello music was great in several scenes — I commented as such to my wife (without having heard of the NPR story until just now).
I’ve not seen King of Comedy, but I turned to my wife and said, “This feels like Taxi Driver,” and then…Deniro(I had no idea he was in this movie). Yeah, they knew it was comic book Taxi Driver.
When they played the clip of his stand up comedy and he said “When I said I wanted to be a comedian everyone laughed at me, well look around… nobody is laughing now are they?” I thought it was a legit funny joke. Then I realized he was not making a joke, just patting himself on the back.