Movie of the Month: Joker

A lot of pearls were clutched when this dropped at the Venice Film Festival, with more than one critic calling it ‘dangerous.’ Well, clearly these bold souls have never been at a bus stop near The Square Peg on a Friday night. What we have here is a fairly straight blend of Taxi Driver and King of Comedy, the Scorsese vibe set off by a version of Gotham City that looks a lot like 1980s New York. Joaquin Phoenix — blistering — is a mentally-ill clown who falls through the cracks and discovers a taste for mass murder, becoming a strange folk hero in the process. Nihilistic and dark, this is the grim obverse of a Marvel movie, in a DC universe. Even if you never shake the sense that it’s the movie equivalent of your teenage cousin who’s just discovered Misfits and Camus, this against-the-odds hit is still the movie everyone’s going to be talking about. See it at Cineworld at Resorts World. Choose from 42 screenings this weekend alone. Times & tickets