JOKER: FOLIE Á DEUX

Here is the decision, plainly. This sequel is competently made — three stars' worth of craft, with musical numbers that are its genuine high point and even hint, for a while, at redemption for Arthur Fleck. There is a light in it. But the film itself lets the darkness win.

The mood is chaotic and pessimistic from the opening frame to a shocking final twist the source calls depressing and unsatisfying. Add lots of strong, gratuitous foul language, some extreme and disturbing violence, and a partially depicted love scene, and you have a movie whose brightest lyrics can't lift its own gloom.

The source is blunt: media-wise viewers will not find this Joker amusing, much less enlightening or inspiring. So our answer is just as blunt — skip it, and if you've been curious about the first film, the source says this ending removes any reason to watch either one.

Arthur Fleck — the man who became the Joker — sits in Arkham Asylum, sunk in depression, awaiting a murder trial where his lawyer plans an insanity defense.

Then his guard signs him up for a musical therapy group, and Arthur locks eyes with Lee, a blonde inmate and arsonist. A romance blossoms. The two sing to each other; Arthur imagines fantasy musical numbers with her. Will love reform him — or does Lee love the very worst in him? His trial begins, and with it come some major plot twists. We'll leave those where they belong.

Three stars, and here's where they come from. The songs are the film's real achievement — including three famous pop spirituals, "Will the Circle Be Unbroken," "When the Saints Go Marching In," and "Get Happy," whose lyrics all celebrate going joyfully to Heaven. Those numbers are a high point, and they hint there might be some redemption in store for Arthur.

The rest works against them. The film carries a frequently dark, chaotic mood that ultimately overcomes any positive content, and it ends on a twist the source says obliterates any rational artistic or business sense in making the movie at all. One courtroom moment — a man recounting a murder that has haunted him — is called the most moving, best-acted scene here. But moments aren't enough. This is a well-crafted film that defeats itself.

At bottom this is a dark, pessimistic film with a mixed pagan worldview — strongly humanist and, the source says, somewhat nihilistic, implying the world is run by a dark and evil fate that saps and destroys any expectation of goodness or happiness. That's the air the whole movie breathes.

There is real light mixed in. Romantic and moral and even Christian elements surface: compassion, the possibility of redemption, songs about the power of love and about a joyful heaven. Arthur's relationship with Lee seems, for a while, to make him a better man. But their bond is built on Lee's obsession with the chaotic, evil Joker side of him — the "folie á deux," two people sharing one delusion — so the film pulls Arthur back toward the worst version of himself.

The source credits this sequel with one improvement: unlike the first film's celebration of class-warfare rioting, this one seems to treat the public's obsession with chaos and famous killers as a bad thing. Yet it still leans on the lawyer's plea that Arthur isn't fully responsible for his actions because of his abuse — leaving a residue of moral relativism and lawlessness.

The film longs for happiness and heaven in its songs but can't believe in either. Scripture offers what it can't: "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it" (John 1:5). Here, tragically, the film lets it.

There's real craft here, and a handful of songs that reach toward heaven. But the source is clear that this movie's darkness swallows its own best moments, ending on a twist that's simply depressing. So our answer holds: skip it. Looking for something worth the evening instead? Try our latest family-friendly picks.