Joker 2: what does the title Folie à deux mean? – Cinema News

Released in theaters on October 2, the sequel to “Joker” has the subtitle “Folie à deux”. But do you know what this term means which is never pronounced in Todd Phillips' feature film?

Five years after its public success (1.079 billion dollars in worldwide revenue) and critical success (2 Oscars, including Best Actor for Joaquin Phoenix), the Joker made his return to the cinema. With a sequel still signed by Todd Phillips, in which Arthur Fleck meets the Clown Prince of Crime's most famous partner: Harley Quinn.

Born in an episode of the Batman animated series from the 90s, she was only supposed to be one of these interchangeable accomplices of the nemesis of the Bat Man, and not to return afterwards. Or not as often. Because Bruce Timm and Paul Dini quickly felt that they had something, and this is how Harley Quinn became inseparable from the Joker, before standing on her own two feet.

First played by Margot Robbie, in both Suicide Squad and the spin-off Birds of Prey, she now has the features of Lady Gaga, in a sequel in the form of a musical drama entitled Folie à deux. In French in the text, as Todd Phillips quickly made it clear by announcing the title at the same time as he formalized his return to Gotham City. But what does this term mean, which is never mentioned in the feature film released on October 2?

Because it is not the title of one of the songs covered by Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga on screen, but rather a psychiatric term. Which designates a case of shared psychosis (or induced psychosis): i.e. the adoption of the delusional theme of a psychotic individual and the lifestyle linked to it by a loved one, also psychotic.

A syndrome that is most often diagnosed when two or more patients live in close proximity, are socially or physically isolated, and have little interaction with people in the outside world. Which fits completely with the story of this new Joker, where Arthur and Harley meet while they are both interned in Arkham Asylum, and share the same vision of the world, which is reflected in particular by the fact to communicate in songs at times or this taste for disguise.

From X-Files to Psycho

For some, the term “Folie à deux” will not be new. Because it was the title of episode 19 of season 5 of The X-Files, and the fifth album by the group Fall Out Boy. And this sequel to Joker is not the first to integrate this syndrome at the heart of its story: in 2006, in Bug by William Friedkin, Ashley Judd ended up adhering to the delusional vision of the world that her companion (Michael Shannon), locked in a motel room with her, sent him back.

And the series Bates Motel, a prequel to Psycho, showed how Norman (Freddie Highmore) descended into madness as he adhered to the paranoid ideas of his mother (Vera Farmiga). Also at the heart of season 1 of Scream or the film Intruders, the term is therefore not new in pop culture. But this sequel to Joker could put him a little more forward. Especially if success is still there.

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