Jimmy Dougan’s review published on Letterboxd:
Tries so hard to be all clever and self-deconstructive that it just winds up feeling a bit plodding and mean-spirited. A Hollywood humiliation ritual for both Phoenix and those who earnestly emphasised with Fleck in the first film. How mean :(
It’s funny that their $190 million sequel is just a gentle rehash of the events of the first film, but not funny in the way Field and co. think it is. They should’ve escaped from Arkham and gone on the run or summin’, maybe set up an underground jazz bar to give Gaga something to do.
Phoenix is great, Gaga feels oddly underused - the film is a little too scared of her megawatt power - and subsequently the songs just slow it all down. I like how Harvey Dent, usually portrayed as a paragon of integrity pre-cooking, is actually a scumbag sleaze who wants the death penalty. And the evil judge looks like Martin Scorsese: the joyless grouch stopping the comic book character having some fun, the film posits.
An amazing ending does not an amazing film make, sadly. A big swing, a giant miss.
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