Joker vs The Irishman: A Second Round in the Eternal Battle Between the Popular and the Artistic - Pt 1
Harry Penwell
A Man in Face Paint stands over a Man Who Paints Houses. Each holds a gun to the other. But who will make the killing shot? Is this the time when one-billion-dollar-making genre films finally take over from the old classics? Perhaps. But behind all this, a Parasite looms, and the new gods, those of Netflix and direct-to-streaming, are rising. Whose battle is it really? And who will win?
A Catch-Up
Now, I hope that most of you will remember my first article for OnScreen (if not, give it a read and come back. You’ll enjoy this one more if you do, I promise). In the article I debated the merits of ‘popular’ and ‘artistic’ films, after the venerable director, Martin Scorsese, compared Marvel movies to ‘theme parks’. I concluded in that article that genre, and ‘franchise’ films, such as the MCU, are no less ‘cinema’ than their traditionally artsy counterparts. I also argued that the actual problem might be that they are preventing other genres of films from succeeding in cinemas. Furthermore, I discussed that this whole debate only stems from some sort of elitist feeling that pervades all forms of art and entertainment, and that this is more of a problem than another Spider-Man reboot doing well at the box office.
I’d like to quickly change one of my definitions. I stated that the battle between the ‘artistic’ and ‘popular’ is also a battle between ‘genre’ and ‘literary’ films, but I’d like to specify this further. Some genres are considered to be more ‘artistic’ than ‘popular’ and can do amazingly in the awards season. For example, you would struggle to find someone who calls The Godfather an artistically inferior film, even though it’s technically a ‘gangster’ genre film. Certain types of Westerns and romances also fall into this category of ‘artistic genres’ (your Hell or Highwaters and Titanics belong here). The main category of genre that I’m arguing is often considered less artistic, is the speculative fiction genre. This is a ‘broad literary genre encompassing any fiction with supernatural, fantastical or futuristic elements’. Other genres, such as many thrillers, some horror and lots of action films aren’t necessarily in this sub-category but are looked at in the same way. But, to keep it all simple, I’m going to lump all of these ‘popular’ films together as ‘genre’ films.
The 2020 Oscars – A Night of Twists and Turns
Now that that’s of the way, next came the Oscars. Quick confession, I wrote the Marvel and Martin Scorsese article all the way back in the last months of 2019, when Scorsese made his comments. Therefore, I made little allusion to the effect the 2020 Oscars would have on the debate. But the awards have come and gone now, and I think that it signals a change. Or the beginning of one.
Joker, Todd Phillips dark masterpiece, which had Joaquin Phoenix as the titular character, received 11 nominations at the Oscars. This is three more than The Dark Knight, which received eight nominations, the previous highest for a comic book film. In addition, Scorsese’s The Irishman, only earned ten nominations. Furthermore, Joker won two Oscars - Phoenix won an Oscar for Best Actor and Hildur Guðnadóttir won for Best Original Score. The Irishman, however, won nothing. No awards at all.
Of course, Joker and The Irishman were only in contention for six awards, and Joker only won awards in categories that The Irishman wasn’t nominated in. So, honestly, despite the set up for this article, The Academy doesn’t offer much opportunity to compare these great films, at least directly. But what it does offer is the chance to compare overall trends. First, it shows that Black Panther was not a one-off in terms of comic-book awards success, particularly with Joker receiving a Best Picture nomination. Second, it shows that if you want to be nominated for an acting award in a comic-book film, play the Joker. Third, it shows that no matter the victor in this battle between Joker and The Irishman, it was Parasite, and non-English language films as a whole, that were the real victors of the event (but that’s the topic for another article entirely). Finally, it shows that, even more than releasing a genre film, or a non-English language film, releasing a film on Netflix is tantamount to awards suicide.
An Artistic Attraction to Psychopaths
I’d like to take a quick moment to focus on that second point. Is it the Joker? I mean, seriously, the only comic book character to get nominated, let alone win, for an acting Oscar, is the Joker. Both thoroughly deserved wins from Heath Ledger and Joaquin Phoenix, of course, but there are other performances that are arguably just as deserving. Robert Downey Jr is Tony Stark, and he deserves recognition, particularly for his performance in Endgame. Josh Brolin and Tom Holland both gave fantastic performances in Infinity War which brought humanity and depth to Thanos and Spider-Man, respectively.
And then there are Chadwick Boseman and Michael B Jordan’s incredible depictions of Black Panther and Killmonger in Black Panther. Or Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart’s tragic acting in Logan or Ryan Reynolds comic genius in Deadpool. Gal Gadot certainly deserves more recognition for Wonder Woman, and Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn was great as well, although she needs a film good enough to back her up. Maybe a Joker-esque look at the character, where we see a perfectly sane psychiatrist slowly fall to the chaos of the Joker?
And I’ve had to contain myself, even with that name-drop heavy paragraph, simply because comic-book films live or die by their casting. And it could happen as well. Johnny Depp, Alec Guinness and Ian McKellen have been nominated for their fantastic portrayals of genre characters such as Captain Jack Sparrow, Obi-Wan and Gandalf, respectively so a particularly convincing role in a genre blockbuster can be enough to get a nomination, if not a win.
Something about the Joker has clearly resonated with The Academy, critics and fans, however. And I think this is two-fold. First, we love a good psychopath. Let’s be honest, it’s terrific to see an actor let loose, portraying a character with traits that we repress in ourselves. They’re also screen stealers. Think of The Dark Knight and you think of Heath Ledger’s Joker, not Christian Bale’s Batman. Think of No Country for Old Men and you think of Javier Barden as the chilling Anton Chigurh. Think of Silence of the Lambs and you think of Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lector.
Stepping Out of Genre
Second, it can be argued that the Joker is only a comic book villain because he was written for comic books. He’s a character that’s almost human, particularly in his most recent adaptation. The only difference between him and a Scorsese character, such as Rupert Pupkin in The King of Comedy, or Frank Sheeran in The Irishman, is that he fights a man dressed as a bat, and dresses himself like a clown. He’s not wearing a suit of fantastical armour, he’s not an alien or an Amazon. He’s not a purple CGI titan who wants to destroy half of all life. He’s just a man with a skewed sense of both comedy and right and wrong. The Clown Prince of Crime. In Joker, the main comic-book part of his origin story, him falling into a vat of acid, was removed and so this more realistic Joker was produced. Had Thanos merely been a man, and perhaps if his goal was to destroy half of Earth with nukes, we might instead be having this discussion about Josh Brolin’s portrayal.
And this brings me to my final point for this part of the article. Is it all down to marketing? Of course, Oscar campaigns are very important, once again another topic, and films like Black Panther benefitted immensely from Oscar buzz. But most of the time, the genre films that are best received by The Academy are those that step outside of their genres.
For example, Joker is more psychological thriller, and study of mental illness and societal ills, than comic book movie, and loses all mentions of superpowers. Black Panther is a comic book film, with superpowers, but is also a study of racial prejudice and colonisation. Silence of the Lambs is a horror, but also a psychological study of serial killers. The Dark Knight perfected the reboot of the comic book genre that Batman Begins had started, and so stepped out of its genre by reinventing it. And Birdman is arguably the inverse of this theory, in that it’s a ‘literary’ film which introduces genre and superhero elements as a study of cultural trends.
To be honest, I think that Avengers: Infinity War is the better film than Black Panther, but it is a comic book movie through and through, and so was pushed aside at the awards. The only Best Picture winning genre film that I can think of that didn’t step out of its genre is The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. Star Wars was nominated, but even it lost out to Annie Hall.
What Makes it Human?
Overall, it could be argued that it’s about finding the human story, or humanity, in genre which allows for them to be nominated at The Academy or allows them to be considered ‘artistic’. But then I’d say that Infinity War, which is a terrific look at the very human desire to save the world (both Thanos and the Avengers portray this) and to look after our loved ones at any cost, both at a personal scale and a universe-wide scale, follows this. Therefore, there needs to be something more. Something that says, ‘look I’m not part of a genre, you don’t need to be ashamed!’ And I think that’s a shame, in and of itself, and means that many fantastic films aren’t given the credit they deserve. Once again, I’m not arguing that popular, genre, films are better than artistic ones, but that they deserve an equal footing when it comes to critical praise. Just as artistic films deserve equal footing when it comes to commercial success.
In part two of this article, I will look at the critical reception of Joker, problems with portraying violence, and the new competitor of streaming. Stay tuned.