Lady Gaga returns to the Lido with Jocker

It is unlikely to win the Golden Lion this time, but Joker: Folie à Deux, the sequel to the Jocker, with which Todd Phillips won the palmeres at the Lido in 2019, could well stand on its own. There is no sense that this is the second instalment of a story. Part musical, part psychothriller, part love story it does not meet any verisimilitude criteria and does so consistently, following the hallucinations of the protagonist, who is always him, the irrepressibly good Joaquin Phoenix.

Always two-faced, shifty, subterranean and explosive at the same time, Phoenix is never certain of his identity: whether he is the calculating, multi-murderous Arthur Fleck or his mask, Joker, with his face plastered with white lead, and plastered in red and blue like a clown. Phoenix/Arthur is interned at Arkham, awaiting trial for his five murders. Or maybe six.

While walking down a prison corridor, he is attracted by the gaze of a girl, Lee, played by Lady Gaga, whose sight stirs an inner music within Arthur. This is where the duets begin, enchanting, sung in low voices, without showing off Gaga's supreme vocality, which is coupled with Phoenix's remarkable one. Then they explode into remakes of all-time great songs, such as That's Entertainment! from Vincent Minnelli's 1953 hit Variety Show.

The love that arises between the two seems first and foremost consoling for Arthur's sick soul, an outcast, a victim of abuse and abandonment. But perhaps it also triggers his more megalomaniacal and exhibitionist, violent and socially dangerous side.

Lady Gaga returns to the Lido six years after A Star is Born, in which she was directed by Bradley Cooper. In the dual soul of Harley Quinn/Lee, she shows herself without make-up and with only her acting and singing talent at her disposal. Which is enough to hold up the big screen. The fans who have been thronging the red carpet since last night know this...