On September 4th, all eyes will be on the Venice Film Festival for the first screening and reactions to “Joker: Folie à Deux.” If it gets anything near the loudest raves 2019’s “Joker” got from its Venice premiere, repeat Oscar nominations, if not wins for the movie, Joaquin Phoenix, Todd Phillips, and Lady Gaga will be virtually engraved by every pundit. However, that could be the case even if the reviews aren’t that great – since they didn’t have to be for “Joker” either.
It is true that “Joker’s” biggest fans were very loud, and the Academy spoke louder in support of it and Phoenix at Oscar time. But from a numbers perspective, “Joker” objectively went down as one of our era’s worst-reviewed Best Picture nominees. As one of only six Best Picture nominees in the expanded ballot era to score below 70% on Rotten Tomatoes and one of only six to score below 60 on Metacritic, “Joker” won two Oscars and got nominated for 11 overall in defiance of what critics thought of it, not because of it.
Since it came out in a year with the likes of “Parasite,” “The Irishman,” “1917,” “Little Women,” “Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood” and “Marriage Story” as fellow Best Picture films, it wasn’t like “Joker” slipped in because of a weak field. Maybe it was just a weak bubble since fellow mixed-reviewed film “Jojo Rabbit” was the other big fall festival winner that year at TIFF and went on to win Best Adapted Screenplay, too. However, as strong as 2019 otherwise was, it still let “Joker” slip into the center of Oscar season – and 2024 looks even more wide open for “Joker: Folie à Deux” right now.
As such, when the first reactions to “Joker: Folie à Deux” come from Venice, they may need to be universally negative to really matter. But with the kind of cultural battle lines drawn over “Joker,” its place in the ‘elevated’ comic book genre, the various other fanbases who embraced the original, and the newfound addition of Gaga and her base, it could be almost guaranteed that “Joker: Folie à Deux” gets at least 50% approval as a baseline. And as it stands, 50% might be all it needs.
Of course, “Joker” needed a couple of other things to drown out its biggest critics, which “Joker: Folie à Deux” might find a little harder to match. The first was “Joker” winning the Venice Golden Lion, which instantly validated it as a real awards film instead of just a comic book movie. However, if there’s any chance the sequel could do the same, then more unanimous raves would probably be needed this time – either that or competitors like “Maria,” “The Brutalist,” “The Room Next Door,” “Queer” and others would all have to fall flat too.
Second, “Joker’s” billion-dollar box office for a superhero movie that didn’t have Batman, any actual heroes, or set-ups for a cinematic universe was greater validation than any critic could have given. Yet that was achieved in 2019, at the tail end of the peak of both the superhero and billion-dollar blockbuster era. Now in the age of “superhero fatigue,” where it takes multiverses and countless callback cameos for a comic book film to cross a billion dollars – and where mixed-reviewed superhero films without them fall flatter these days – “Joker: Folie à Deux” has a more difficult but not impossible task to strike it big like its predecessor. Though without awards or promising reviews from Venice, it might be much harder.
If “Joker: Folie à Deux” only starts in the 60% range on the Tomatometer and starts in the 50s on Metacritic, that alone might not be enough to take it off the Oscar charts. Even if it tumbles into “Rotten” scores on Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic later on, that on its own isn’t disqualifying in an age where “Bohemian Rhapsody” and “Don’t Look Up” survived such rotten reviews. And if it only makes about $800 million worldwide – which would still outgross the $710 million worldwide of “Dune: Part Two” – maybe that doesn’t entirely finish it off right away.
Frankly, “Joker” set such a low bar regarding how reviews mattered for a so-called artsy blockbuster, setting it slightly lower at Venice wouldn’t be enough to totally write off its sequel – not until the rest of the world got to see it, anyway. In that context, the premiere would have to be a critical disaster of “Bardo” or “The Son” proportions for the biggest pans in Venice to be immediately disqualifying. Otherwise, a mere 50/50 split from Venice critics would be the bare minimum to keep it alive, even without winning another Golden Lion.
Of course, if that’s all it takes for a film like “Joker: Folie à Deux” to stay in the Oscar conversation, imagine what would happen if the reviews were all or mostly good. It may not take much imagination since that’s already happened for a Warner Bros blockbuster sequel to a Best Picture nominee just this year.
Two years after “Joker,” Warner Bros launched another Venice premiere turned blockbuster film turned Best Picture nominee in “Dune.” Quite honestly, the reviews weren’t too great for “Dune” in spite of all that, yet they weren’t at “Joker” levels. “Dune’s” mere 83% on Rotten Tomatoes and a 74 on Metacritic were about average or below average for a Best Picture nominee in the expanded era – but they were more than good enough in a pandemic year with no other blockbusters and a few much worse reviewed nominees.
Therefore, when “Dune: Part Two” was set for release early this year – after the strikes kept it from premiering at Venice last year – it was in the same boat that “Joker: Folie à Deux” is in now. It didn’t really need to improve that much on its predecessor’s reviews as long as it was another box office hit and got just enough raves from its biggest critical fans. Yet, despite not needing to jump so high over this low bar, it did so anyway.
With 92% on Rotten Tomatoes, a 79 on Metacritic, a non-pandemic-affected box office run, and far bigger raves about how it had to be seen on the most giant screen, “Dune: Part Two” took enough of a leap over the Best Picture nominated originally to become a mortal lock all its own. Although it’s been months since its theatrical run, and countless more aspiring nominees are on the way from the festivals, “Dune: Part Two” is a unanimous pick to stay in the field no matter what.
It still may come nowhere near winning Best Picture – if only because a third film is still looming – and Denis Villeneuve could always get snubbed from a Best Director nomination at the last minute again. However, “Dune: Part Two” is either the closest thing to being a lock for a Best Picture nomination before the festivals start, or it is one of only two or three locks at the moment. Maybe that isn’t entirely because it got noticeably better scores and deeper critical adoration than the original, but it certainly helped seal the deal.
In that regard, “Dune: Part Two” is a far more aspirational model for “Joker: Folie à Deux” than “Joker” is. It could also be an obstacle as well if enough voters don’t want to give two Warner Bros blockbuster sequels Best Picture consideration – to say nothing of what might happen if “Gladiator II” joins them as another blockbuster sequel to a past blockbuster Oscar winner.
Another easy argument against “Joker: Folie à Deux” is that it is a sequel, and the shock of a Joker origin story being a wild/artsy drama from a former comedy director and an overdue leading man won’t be there for it, this time. Yet, as “Dune: Part Two” proved, a blockbuster sequel can do more than just repeat its predecessor – and aim to do better than it even if it doesn’t necessarily have to.
Nonetheless, “Dune: Part Two” had the safety net of Frank Herbert’s source material and a director like Villeneuve. For “Joker: Folie à Deux,” its turn into a dark romance fantasy prison musical takes it even further left field from established Joker/Batman mythology than the original, with a director in Phillips that still doesn’t have Villeneuve’s kind of standing with critics and the online community. Still, being merely divisive is sometimes all a director or a movie needs if everything else breaks their way, with “Joker” as perhaps one of the prime examples of this era.
Yet between “Joker: Folie à Deux” not having the surprise factor of the original, not screening at any other festival unlike the original, Phoenix’s newfound toxic buzz after his “cold feet” caused a prepped to shoot gay romance/detective film from Todd Haynes to be scrapped, and the long odds of a repeat Golden Lion win, the obstacles for the sequel are starting to look more formidable. But again, how many of them does it really need to completely overcome?
If the Venice premiere of “Joker: Folie à Deux” brings more significant and hyperbolic online reactions than “Joker’s,” then all of this is moot, and its place in Oscar season is likely locked. If the scores from Venice and beyond are just merely mediocre, that might still be enough anyway – regardless of what that warns about the quality of the film itself or an Oscar race that could still let it slide just like five years ago.
How do you think the fall film festivals will shape the Oscar race? Are you looking forward to “Joker: Folie à Deux?” Do you think it will be a significant Oscar player just as the first film was? What did you think of “Joker?” Please let us know in the comments below or on Next Best Picture’s X account and be sure to check out Next Best Picture’s latest Oscar predictions here.
You can follow Robert and hear more of his thoughts on the Oscars & Film on X @Robertdoc1984
