The character of the Joker in 'The Dark Knight' (2008): his role in deconstructing the materialist values of Gotham's citizenry.

(picture courtesy of dookieadz.deviant art.com)

The character of the Joker in ‘The Dark Knight’: his role in deconstructing the materialist values of Gotham’s citizenry

The mysterious, absolute character of the joker in The Dark Knight has captured the imagination of film audiences since the film premiered in July 2008. Interest in the character was driven to the point of frenzy, prior to the film’s release, following the death of Heath Ledger in January 2008 from a drug overdose after filming was completed. Interest in his performance was justified as some moviegoers were taken aback by the raw portrayal of the character. It seemed as if Ledger had penetrated the core of madness with his characterization. He justifiably won the academy award for best supporting actor which was one of two awards won by the film. This is the year 2011 and when you ask the casual moviegoer what he or she recalls about the character they will say that he was psychotic, mesmerizing, and a good foil for the dark knight himself, the batman; however it seems that the philosophical dimensions of the character have not been fully assessed. This is the role of the critic or one who is writing a critique of the film for having witnessed the mesmerizing portrayal of the character, which gave some form to the script by the Nolan brothers, the time comes when one must assess its significance and how this juxtaposes with batman and the Gotham citizenry he claims to be protecting gratis. I argue here that the character of the Joker is effective as a character, not simply because he is mesmerizing or psychotic, but because the character deconstructs the materialist values of the citizenry thereby throwing them into chaos. These materialist values are manifested in the form of private property in the city, with the majority of property in the city in the hands of the bourgeois capitalist class and the mob.  The Joker can be seen as a revolutionary character that has more balls than batman who is merely intent on maintaining the status quo of the bourgeois class of which he is a part. It is only ironic that Batman himself has initiated this chaos with his disregard for the rules propagated by the bourgeoisie by taking the law into his own hands. Bruce Wayne as batman started this process in Batman Begins (2005) without realizing it because the stakes were now raised with batman on the scene and so the criminals would now resort to more drastic measures to ensure that they can still make a profit from the so called illegitimate trade in drugs and activities that encourage human vice and folly. The criminals in Gotham city are represented by the mob that controls this illicit trade and so it is no surprise that they hire the Joker to kill the batman who is the only thing standing in the way of things getting back to normal. This is not a critique of the film The Dark Knight but it is an appreciation of the magnificent screenplay written by director Christopher Nolan and Jonathan Nolan. Few critics have discussed these elements however probably due to the symbolism of the film. This brief assessment will serve to highlight one of the reasons why Nolan’s Batman films are more significant than they may seem. With the expected release of The Dark Knight Rises (2012) I sincerely believe that if he continues in the vein of exploring the materialist basis of Batman’s existence in Gotham city this trilogy will be one of the most significant in film history. The comic element in the batman films is mere symbolism for the darker issues at hand and it is to Nolan’s credit that he has uncovered the foundations of this symbolism.  One must recognize this based on the repeated quotes that Gotham city is one of the richest cities on earth and is home to 30 million inhabitants. One can imagine the amount of exploitation that is taking place by both the bourgeois capitalist class and the mob.

We first meet the joker in the opening scene of the film where a bank robbery is to be staged. When one thief discover that the vault is wired with over a thousand volts another tells him that only a mob bank would have such a device installed. The Joker, they say, must be crazy when in fact this robbery sets off a chain reaction by drawing the mob’s attention. The Joker steals ‘a relatively small amount’ of $68 million in cash from the mob who gain their profits like the bourgeois class by exploiting the less fortunate. When the mob first meet the joker at their conference meeting it is clear that the unease has settled in and this is visible in the actions of the character Gambol, a black man. He is visibly agitated at the sight of the Joker and it seems that the joker has found a chink in the mob’s armor that he can exploit through this character. Maroni at first tries to dismiss the joker as a frivolous character but Gambol’s fury will not be stayed and he goes as far to put the word out that a price is on the joker’s head $500, 000 dead; $1,000, 000 alive ‘ so he can teach him some manners first’. The Joker eventually kills him and reveals his terrifying nature as well as his grand master plan of ‘aggressive expansion’. Therefore the  robbery, involving the $68 million is one sign of the Joker’s deconstruction policy with regards to the materialist values that have made Gotham the richest city on earth. One of the easiest ways to make inroads into any modern day empire is to do away with what makes it rich or keeps the empire afloat and the Joker’s robbery is just a warm up.

It is also clear that Batman and Gordon realize that taking away the mob’s money as well as the source of its profits will eventually disband it and all forms of organized crime and its facilitation of corrupt practices in the judiciary and legislature. The only representative of politics in this film is the mayor and we all know that politicians, as members of the government are primarily responsible for the protection, maintenance and development of national property for as the joker says ‘when I say that one little old mayor will die. Well then everybody loses their minds’.  In any case this has adverse effects: the mob has discovered the plans of batman and the police and so their accountant, Lau, funnels the mob’s funds through his investment company located in Hong Kong. Lucius fox (Morgan Freeman) points out to Bruce that Lau’s company has been growing at 8% per annum like ‘clock work…his revenue streams must be off the books, maybe even illegal’. He is clearly a money launderer for the mob because any sign of money laundering is naturally linked to illegitimate activity (so called). It is clear then that batman, like the joker, sees the finances of the mob as the source of their strength however as Alfred says to Bruce, who believes the mob crossed the line by employing the joker as a destructive force in the society, ‘You crossed the line first sir; you hammered them to the point of desperation and in their desperation they turned to a man they didn’t understand.’ This desperation is the fear that the mob has of Batman and the police taking away their funds. After Batman captures Lau in Hong Kong the police are able to land over 500 criminals in the courts at once because their racketeering efforts have been exposed following Lau’s betrayal. It is clear that Batman is instituting some form of chaos and this is what Alfred discovers although Bruce seems a bit naïve. The notion of private property is fully on display here and it is clear that when the source of profit of any empire is amiss then it is likely that chaos or serious bouts of anarchy will ensue among the populace. Bruce may be ignorant of what he is doing however the joker is more aware of the chaos that will ensue  and thus appears more brazen in his approach to unsettle the populace. Batman is more unwilling to accept his role in the creation of a void.

When the Joker is captured for the first time, intentionally, so that he can get his hands on Lau, he has a poignant conversation with Batman which changes the complexion of the film because all the issues are laid bare.  After Batman says to the joker, ‘You’re garbage who kills for money.’ He says:

‘Don’t talk like one of them. You’re not. Even if you’d like to be. To them you’re just a freak…like me. They need you right now but when they don’t they’ll cast you out like a leper. You see their morals, their code it’s a bad joke. Dropped at the first sign o’ trouble. They’re only as good as the world allows them to be. I’ll show you. When the chips are down these uh civilized people they’ll eat each other. See I’m not a monster. I’m just ahead of the curve.

The ‘chips are down’ certainly means the void created when the material world of ‘these civilized people’ is laid to waste. Batman is therefore unwittingly creating this void by depriving the mob of their funds whereas the Joker wishes to disrupt the whole society by blowing up physical structures such as hospitals and bridges and killing Judges and Police commissioners (law officials), ‘Look what I did to this town with a few drums o’ gas and a couple o’ bullets’. In the void created by Batman criminals like the Joker must surface to challenge what he represents which is some form of distortion of the mundane world where the fantasies of man are placed at the forefront as opposed to people keeping close to their chest their inner most thoughts. The outward expression of Bruce Wayne is the batman whereas for the joker that of the clown or jester who is essentially a prankster. This is symbolic for along with the joker batman’s main foes represent this duality of the mundane and their personal fantasies. Two Face also represents this dual nature more evidently in the form of his grotesque facial features divided between good and evil: the grotesque form obviously represents evil and the clean unscarred side represents his good nature. There is the penguin, the Riddler, scarecrow, and Catwoman. They all have dual natures and these are the characters who will challenge the batman who has created the void by dismissing the mundane characters of the mob. The chief point is this: the deconstruction of the material world creates a void and this creates an avenue for the idealists to venture forth or a system catering to ‘freaks’ or people with no other purpose but to express their duality or try to represent their dark fantasies. It is almost some form of mysticism for without the proper materialized environment, which has developed significantly during the twentieth and early twenty first century through the innovations made in technology, people are bound to collapse since man’s relationship with the man made material environment is now almost organic. If you take that away it would not be surprising to watch him go insane or reach some new point of mystical enlightenment. The idealists try and anticipate this by aspiring for a meeting with the gods or god in paradise. It is no wonder that the idealists are esteemed more highly in history since they seem to be beyond this world both literally and figuratively (Jesus, Buddha, Socrates, Plato, Marcus Garvey, Muhammed,  Gandhi, Nelson Mandela,  etc). They seem to be on the outside of the material confines o f this world simply because they had an ideal that would serve them forever. Is it any surprise that most of them died in poverty and that their views have made others rich?  Harvey Dent goes insane not only because he lost Rachel but because his material world has collapsed. Look at the coin that he flips constantly when we first meet him. It is a sign of his confidence in himself or his surety of the world in which he lives. ‘I make my own luck,’ he says for the coin is only symbolic since it has two heads and so if you choose heads you will always win the call between heads and tails. His defeat occurs when Rachel dies and this eliminates whatever security he may have had in his limited knowledge of the world for as the Joker says ‘You had plans and look where that got you.’ The mayor tried to warn him that due to his efforts to thwart organized crime people’s pockets will get lighter and they would come after him.’ Dent never listened since he was secure in his limited knowledge and so he paid the ultimate price. His vendetta against the people who had a hand in Rachel’s death is a sign that he has renounced the material world and is now pursuing the ideal of vengeance. It is ironic that some of the people he is pursuing are  members of the police force an obvious sign of the failure of the  judiciary and legislative system.  Joker and the batman have a conversation as he (the joker) hangs upside down

‘This is what happens when an unstoppable force (joker’s ideal) meets an immovable object. You truly are incorruptible (Batman’s ideal), aren’t you?  You won’t kill me out of some misplaced sense of self righteousness (again an ideal of batman). And I won’t kill you because you’re just too much fun. I think you and I are destined to do this forever (idealist).’ ‘You’ll be in a padded cell forever.’ ‘Maybe we could share one. You know they’ll be doubling up at the rate these city’s inhabitants are losing their minds.’ ‘This city just showed you that it’s full of people ready to believe in good.’ ‘Until their spirit (material world) breaks completely. Until they get a good look at the real Harvey Dent and all the heroic things he’s done. You didn’t think I’d risk losing Gotham’s soul in a fist fight with you? No you need an ace in the hole. Mine’s Harvey.’ ‘What did you do?’ ‘I took Gotham’s white knight and brought him down to our level. It wasn’t hard. See, madness, as you know is like gravity. All it takes is a little push. (no security)’

The joker has a similar conversation with Chechen, one of the heads in the mob, when he burns a stockpile of money and says ‘All you care about is money. This town deserves a better class o’ criminal.’ Chechen says ‘They won’t work for a freak.’ ‘A freak. (imitating chechen’s accent). Why don’t’ we cut you up into little pieces and feed you to your pooches hmmm. Then we’ll see how loyal a hungry dog really is.’ He is obviously saying that without their money the mob will not be able to provide for their followers much less command them. Joker knows where the other half is and when he burns the stockpile of money he burns Lau (on top of the pile), the only other person who had knowledge of the whereabouts of the other half and he has thus defeated or usurped the mob’s role as a force in society simply by depriving them of their money. (It is debatable whether Batman’s comment about him killing for money may have had some effect but that will be only an assumption.)When the Joker tells batman that they see him as a freak he is obviously speaking about the police and the politicians who need Batman to take down the mob by breaking all the rules. When they do not need him anymore they will cast him out similar to how the capitalist casts out the worker when there is a crisis (recession). This occurs at the end of the film at Batman’s request since someone had to be pinned for the murders and it clearly would not have been Harvey Dent.   The mob also employed the Joker and when he told them he had located the money they immediately informed the police of his whereabouts to try and trap him so he burned the money. After disposing of the mob he realizes that he does not want to know the identity of the batman because without batman ‘the mob (would) ground out a little profit and the police try to shut them down one block at a time and it was so boring.’ The joker obviously realized that the police would be no competition for him in the void devoid of the security of the material world however batman who is an idealist like himself would be a worthy opponent.

The Joker proudly calls himself an agent of chaos and in this material world chaos comes about when all the physical structures are removed and with it the people’s sensibilities which are tied to the security of this material world. This is why the Joker suffers a defeat when the citizens in one ferry and criminals in the other refuse to blow up each other which is reflective of the faith they have in the Judiciary and legislative system maintained by their taxes. Batman mistakenly calls this faith in the judiciary and legislature as the faith in being good or maybe it was Nolan trying to be politically correct. Who knows?

This is why the character of the joker is significant and it is not simply because he is psychotic or mesmerizing. Let’s hope Nolan can continue this premise in his next batman film.