What’s In a Laugh?

It’s been interesting to see the critical praise for Parasite and the critical condemnation for Joker given that they’re basically the same film. The main point of each film, as Joaquin Phoenix explicitly states in Joker, is that "you get what you deserve." However, the main difference between these films is that Joker begins as a tragedy and ends as a comedy while Parasite begins as a comedy and ends as a tragedy. Consequently, the shared point of these films gets expressed as a moral in Parasite but a punchline in Joker.

And I can't help but wonder if this explains the difference in critical reception. The tragic ending in Parasite doesn’t fundamentally alter the dynamic that led to this ending, but only reinforces it, because the main characters become further resigned to their reality. However, Joker's comedic ending, which is all but identical to the ending in Parasite, is instead a moment of liberation. But it's not the violence that's liberating, because this violence occurs in both films. Instead, it's the laughter. The laughter is liberating, and it's the laughter that poses a threat.

And perhaps it not only poses a threat to the reality of austerity that these films similarly portray, but perhaps also to the critics who are endeared to Parasite but repulsed by Joker.

Update (October 27, 2019): I had one more thought about the critical praise given to Parasite and the critical condemnation given to Joker even though they're basically the same film.

In Joker, there is an awareness of the relationship between wealth and poverty. The poor are poor because the rich are rich. And this injustice is what precipitates Joker’s violence. If only Joker had received the type of social services that he so desperately needed, the story would have ended very differently, but he didn’t receive them because the rich are hoarding wealth.

In Parasite, however, there is no such awareness. You have similar extremes in wealth, with one very poor family and another very rich one, but the economic relationship between these families is never explained. There are insightful cultural meditations on poverty and wealth, such as when one character remarks of the rich family that “they’re rich but still nice,” and another character responds that “they’re nice because they’re rich.” But this comment only speaks to the benefits of wealth—that it prevents you from living the type of life that gives poor people sharp edges—without explaining wealth or poverty. Consequently, what precipitates the violence in Parasite is a cultural slight, as we find that the wealthy father looks down on the poor father for “smelling like radishes.” If only the wealthy father had shown more respect, Parasite would have had a much different ending.

And again, I can’t help but wonder if this difference is why these films were received in such different ways. It’s a difference expressed quite subtly in the films, as the lesson you draw from Joker is that wealth shouldn’t exist, while the lesson from Parasite is that poverty shouldn’t exist. The way that you achieve the former is by redistributing wealth, but unless this is your plan for achieving the latter, what you have is empty moralism. We can lament the tragedy of poverty, but without a willingness to recognize that poverty exists because of wealth, our lamentations are empty gestures.

This is a pretty telling revelation about the state of American politics, where even the right wing laments the growth in inequality, but where only one candidate is calling for the elimination of the billionaire class. Not coincidentally, that politician has faced his own share of critical condemnation.