Joker = Spectatorship

Question 1

What is spectatorship in Joker?

Answer 1

• It explores how viewers engage with Arthur Fleck subverting typical audience expectations forcing them to confront mental illness, societal alienation and violence

Question 2

What is spectatorship?

Answer 2

• Rejects the notion that the audience are a mass group and instead builds a personal relationship with each individual who experiences it

Question 3

What is Stuart Hall’s reception theory?

Answer 3

• All films are encoded with ideological messages that are then decoded by the spectators

Question 4

What are the three types of reading?

Answer 4

1. Dominant reading which is the idea that spectators will identify the encoded ideologies and agree with them (Passive)
2. Negotiated reading which is that the spectator identifies and understands the reading but forms their own (Active)
3. Oppositional reading where the spectators reject the preferred reading and reject the ideologies presented (Active)

Question 5

What are the three stages in how a spectator can respond?

Answer 5

1. Recognition = We have a shared understanding of the world with the director. The director does not have to directly tell us
2. Alignment = Identifying with the protagonist. It is possible to break alignment if the character conflicts with the spectators morality
3. Allegiance = Secure loyalty to the superior person. Identification based on external attitudes

Question 6

Whose POV do we see Joker from?

Answer 6

• The film is told from Arthur’s Fleck perspective, it blurs the lines between reality and distortion. We are positioned to experience the world through Arthur’s eyes which creates empathy.
• This forces to acknowledge that his actions are violent and erratic which questions whether we should sympathise or question his reliability as a narrator

Question 7

Does the film need active spectatorship?

Answer 7

• Joker needs active spectatorship as we see it from the perspective of Arthur who is unstable, we may be sympathic to Joker and ambigious of whether we should support him or question him

Question 8

Does Arthur encourage active spectatorship?

Answer 8

• Arthur is someone who the audience empathises for even after involving in criminal behaviour
• People criticise Joker as it justifies violence as a way for vulnerable people to empower themselves
• We first align with Arthur as we he see him struggle and have sympathy for his character but the alignment then changes as we have a lot less sympathy for him. We see Arthur through periods of his life where he is struggling such as being beaten up and finding out he’s adopted but as his spiral into Joker begins there is a transformation where some people may feel less aligned with him

Question 9

What does the film critique?

Answer 9

• The film critiques societies failure of poverty, mental illness and social isolation which forces the audience to reflect on their own world and furthermore his descent into violence is due to systematic neglect therefore how has the spectators contributed to this within their own society
• The audience must critically engage with the narrative due to an unknowingness of what is real

Question 10

How has Phillips encouraged passive spectatorship?

Answer 10

• Depicted anti-capitalism and clear that political message is trying to get across

Question 11

Will everyone align in the same way?

Answer 11

• Spectators may align themselves which different characters or ideas presented in Joker
• Eg. Arthur, Murray, Sophie

Question 12

How may different audience readings respond?

Answer 12

Dominant = Provoke conversation about systemic neglect and people feel sympathy for Arthur
Oppositional = Violence and riots are not the answer or capitalists be implied as the bad people who resulted in this
Negotiated = Does portray systemic neglect of society but not through murder and rioting