FILM REVIEW
The People’s Joker
Unrated
92 Minutes
Released September 13, 2022 (Toronto Film Festival)
By Dolores Quintana
“The People’s Joker” is a heartfelt and ultimately heartwarming journey of the self. The film received its US premiere last week at Outfest. Vera Drew directed, co-wrote with Bri LeRose, and stars as Joker the Harlequin. Joker is called an “unfunny clown,” and the film has the guts to go through with it. Quite a bit of the film’s lacerating humor is directed at Joker the Harlequin, and that’s pretty brave. Normally, Joker would be considered the Princess of Crime, but if this Joker were said to have a superpower, it would be stand-up comedy. Oh wait, no, that’s not right.
You may remember films like “Punchline” where admittedly great actors like Sally Field and Tom Hanks floundered when cast as stand-up comedians. Stand-up is a different art form. I’ll talk a little later about how Drew successfully handled that in this film, but first, a quick segway.
Of course, this film can help you understand what it is like to be trans or just what it is like for other human beings. I felt like some things clicked into place while watching the film, and I could really relate to how Joker feels, particularly about Joker’s mother and less-than-perfect relationship with Jason “Mr. J” Todd. One of the things that Drew and the film do well is making the character’s situation so relatable. There is only the most diaphanous of filmy scarves over Joker’s open wounds, but that need to perform and seem okay no matter what is always there, just under the surface.
You see these wounds with young Joker and adult Joker interacting with Joker’s mom. The addiction to Smylex is a big part of that relationship. Joker seeks love and acceptance hence the road to comedy is the one that Joker takes. Identity is at the core of the film. Who you are and your own struggle for self determination. But funny.
The film itself has a satirical style that shows itself with the characters, situations, and background scenery. Much of it is animated, and some seem like rear projection, but this artifice only adds to the film’s dreamlike quality. I feel a temptation to talk too much about many of the different characters and scenes, but I don’t want to spoil too much. But suffice it to say that Drew leans into the discomfort of comedians who bomb. In fact, Drew makes that idea, which terrifies most people who do standup, a virtue.
After the brouhaha at the Toronto Film Festival, it was believed by the few critics who saw and reviewed the film that it might never be seen again, and that would have been a shame. “The People’s Joker” is so much of a personal statement by a director and, in parody, such a different take on the superhero tale that I feel that distribution companies should be racing to give Drew a distribution deal for the film. People complain about seeing many of the same things in the many superhero films and franchises, and “The People’s Joker” has many familiar touchstones but then diverges wildly.
I’ve always been of the opinion that if you are going to make a film about an already existing cinema idea that has been explored extensively or reboot or remake a film, you have to bring something of yourself to the film to be successful. You have to bring new and fresh ideas, or the film is doomed to failure. In cinema, the worst kind of failure is to not be interesting, not engage the audience emotionally, or simply regurgitate what has gone before. Vera Drew has taken the iconography of the Batman movies. and made something that is different from everything that has gone before it, despite using many of the same devices. The difference is that Drew made it personal. That’s what makes “The People’s Joker” a gem.
