Can a Catholic watch The Joker movie?

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I don’t think the story treats the violence as justifiable.

indirect spoilers

Joker’s fall isn’t presented as an heroic path, but more like a tragedy. It happened because, apart from Arthur’s madness, some people close to him didn’t do what they were supposed to do.

I think the moral of the story is “This is what happens to society when people that are well forget to help people that are in a bad situation”.

It is, in the end, a story about the harm that lack of Love can do in a society. Very biblical.
 
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That being the case, I may reconsider. Taxi Driver and Falling Down were to classic movies. Kind of off-beat, but interesting.
 
As a rule, I don’t watch R rated movies anymore, since what is depicted in R rated movies are much worse than R rated movies in decades past. The exception is if they are Christian movies like The Passion of the Christ which was a necessary rating in order to depict the very real torture Jesus endured. The Joker is fiction, and it did not need to be R rated. Whatever the reason, the violence, etc that qualified it for an R rating could have been toned down to make it just as entertaining, and make it PG-13. But since they did, I won’t be watching it. Too bad since I like Joaquin Phoenix as an actor. Loved him in Signs with Mel Gibson.
 
Falling Down was an intense tale. Explained how a psychologically damaged person may behave. A very interesting movie.
 
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Can you distinguish fiction from reality? It’s a movie. I have found that even watching movies like this have teachable moments. And sometimes, they are just entertaining.
 
Johann_du_Toit said:
Can a Catholic watch The Joker starring Joaquin Phoenix
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The film contains a vengeance theme, gun and knife violence, some gore, and fleeting rough and crude language. The Catholic News Service classification is L – limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling.
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Meaning of the rating:
L – Limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling

This highly restrictive classification explicitly indicates that the film will probably be unacceptable to the casual adult moviegoer. It is generally used for those quality films that include more challenging material than an A-III in terms of violence, sexual content (including nudity), language or moral dilemmas, but are still worthy of consideration by mature viewers well-grounded in their faith and open to the portrayal of gritty subject matter. Less often, this classification is applied to movies that – whatever their aesthetic merit or lack thereof – are too strong for an A-III but not sufficiently wayward to receive an “O.”
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With all the nonsense and gratuitous violence spewed by Hollywood lately, this may be actually a decent movie.
 
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What I want to know is if a joker can watch the Catholic movie?
 
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I want to second this comment. One of my good friends struggles with anxiety/depression, and this movie really pushed him into a dark spot this past week. He said it depicted absolutely no hope, and to him dehumanized people struggling with mental health. He advised I not watch it, and I took his word for it, because often times he’s a fan of darker movies, but he absolutely could not do this one.
 
If one is a serious Catholic, one should seek that which is good, true and beautiful. If you are in doubt read the advisory content on the IMDB. I just did and can say wholeheartedly that no saint would ever advise seeing such a movie.
 
An unfortunate but economically understandable reality of modern major blockbusters is that the movie is somewhat ambiguous in its message since it needs to sell in international markets across the world to highly diverse groups of people.

I don’t think the movie deserved any of the negative press prior to its release. It is dark and it explores some of the darker realities of life. I thoroughly enjoyed it but it’s not for everybody.
 
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Also enjoyed it in a dark way. Going for a fourth viewing this weekend. From all indications it’s still going strong even with Melificent out. As some have said, this going into number 2 or 3 this weekend is impressive. It will definitely still be in the top 10 movies for the week, so that tells you something. And that’s all without China factoring in.
 
The Old Testament has some very graphic scenes. R rated at a minimum. Remember the guy who chopped up his daughter into pieces and sent the pieces to each of the tribes? Very dark, gory stuff in some passages… yet recorded for a purpose. Some violent movies are not worth seeing. Others have a purpose.
 
The Bible does contain violent scenes, however clearly that is not the main focus of it.

Besides it is not the same to read about some war conflicts, than to go see a R rated bloody violent movie.
 
I haven’t seen the Joker movie but I’ve read several reviews that reference Taxi Driver and Falling Down as possible influences of the film.

Like you, that makes me kind of want to see it.
 
Not to mention genocides, floods, plagues of locusts, wholesale slaughter of innocent babies, etc. etc. Very gruesome, gory stuff, not suitable for families.
 
The main focus of the Joker isn’t violence either. Violence is like 10% of the movie, and only two scenes are actually bloody (and nothing over the top).

It doesn’t contain all the unnecesary gore and sex scenes other modern films and movies have. It is dark without exaggerating, and I love that 😌
 
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