Joaquin Phoenix Reveals Unexpected Challenge While Filming Joker

Fall is here and Joker‘s big opening weekend is inching closer and closer as the temperature drops. There were a ton of different challenges in getting this movie off the ground and Joaquin Phoenix talked about some of them in a recent interview with Comicbook.com. Unexpected challenges are the name of the game when it comes to assembling a huge Hollywood film like this one. Sometimes great things can come from those struggles and learning how to manage them.

CB: This movie is a wild ride. As a comic book nerd, the pacing of it feels like you are reading issues. It feels like there are some pretty cool chapter breaks. I know you had mentioned before that you had learned a lot about Arthur as you did the filming. Was there a turning point on it for you? Where you felt that you wanted to take Arthur in a certain direction that you hadn’t planned on when you first started?

“I think there are several, but it was such a long time ago that I’m having a hard time remembering. You know, I don’t want to repeat myself and bore you, but a really transformative moment was after the Subway when he’s in the bathroom,” Phoenix began

He elaborated, “That was something that we really hadn’t anticipated. We talked about that scene all throughout rehearsal. When I really kind of struggled to find something that I felt really made sense to kind of illustrate the change from Arthur to Joker. There were things like that every day up until the last scene I shot where we did multiple versions of it.”

“It just was the nature of the character. When Todd [Phillips] and I became comfortable with that, it really began to emerge. That was a really unexpected, strange, and unique process for me. But, it was enjoyable,” Phoenix concluded.

All those takes sound like a painstaking process and the gathering of those performances would probably start to wear a little thing. Although, from critical reception and box office forecasts, it sounds like Joker is headed for a very impressive October. The movie even picked up the top prize from its appearance at the Venice Film Festival this year to the wonderment of some of the entertainment press.

If that weren’t enough, some of the experts have the film in line for a historic October opening weekend at the box office. Sony’s Venom currently sits on top of the record books, but The Hollywood Reporter said that Joker could top that with a staggering $82 million opening weekend. Lower projections also exist, like NRG’s figure of $77 million for the movie. But, still it looks like all that sweat equity is about to pay off for Phillips’ latest comic book film.