It's also being criticised as the "most disturbing" comic book film ever made.

The Joker has been interpreted multiple times over the last 50+ years. First with Cesar Romero’s goofy portrayal in the initial Batman and Robin film, then Jack Nicholson’s more charmingly witty take in the 1989 Tim Burton film, and of course, the infamously cunning and maniacal depiction courtesy of the late Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight.

Todd Phillips is the first director to take the character and devote an entire film to his origin story in Joker and if the early reviews are to be believed, comic book films ‘will never be the same again’.

The film, having premiered at the Venice Film Festival over the weekend, has already inspired millions (probably billions) of words to be written about it. Starring Joaquin Phoenix in the titular role, the film tells the story of Arthur Fleck, a clown for hire and aspiring stand-up comedian who still lives with his ailing mother and resents the fact that the world won’t pay him as much attention as he believes he deserves. Sound familiar?

'Joker' official trailer A first, chilling look at Joaquin Phoenix as The Joker.

The critics are divided on the topic of Phoenix’s performance, with some lauding him for a ‘career best’ turn and others claiming that he actually acts too hard in order to be able to take the film as seriously as it wants to be taken.

But while they disagree about the quality of his performance, what they are almost unanimous in is their assertion that the film is confused in figuring out whether it’s satire or propaganda of white men who, feeling rejected by the world, turn to violence and hatred as the answer to those problems. According to the early reviews, the film walks a thin line that could be potentially harmful if received in the wrong way. It doesn’t seem to handle the themes with the necessary caution it needs in order to avoid glorifying incels and their sometimes violent behaviour.

David Ehrlich of IndieWire called the film “a toxic rallying cry for self-pitying incels,” and believes that it “lacks the discipline or nuance to responsibly handle such hazardous material” in a world of Reddit trolls and maniacal Marvel fans.

Likewise, Jessica Kiang for Playlist wrote that it’s “a film so disturbing it feels almost dangerous: whatever about its hard-R rating, they should maybe think about background checks and a mandatory three-day waiting period at theatres.”

Continuing, she writes, “Joker, based on recognisable IP, and now given the seal of critical and possible awards-consideration approval too, is so aesthetically impressive, effective, and persuasive of its own reality that you see clearly how easily it could be (mis)interpreted and co-opted by the very 4Chan/Incel/”mentally ill loner” element it purports to darkly satirise.”

Vanity Fair’s Richard Lawson opened his own review by noting society’s current obsession with dissecting and finding causation for the motivations of “disaffected white men who’ve turned violent”.

“Whether that violence is born of mental illness, isolation, the culminated rage of masculine identity, or all those bound together in some hideous knot, we seem certain that there is some salvable cause,” he writes, going on to explain that he himself couldn’t stop thinking about this obsession while watching Joker because of the parallels between those ‘disaffected white men’ and Arthur.

Likewise, in a damning review for TIME, Stephanie Zacharek writes that the film is a ‘prime example’ of the ‘emptiness of our culture’. “In America, there’s a mass shooting or attempted act of violence by a guy like Arthur practically every other week. And yet we’re supposed to feel some sympathy for Arthur, the troubled lamb; he just hasn’t had enough love,” she said. “He could easily be adopted as the patron saint of incels.”

With Oscar buzz already thrumming for Phoenix, this will no doubt only be the beginning of the discussion around the film and what it says about incels, masculinity, mental health and violence.

Joker is out in Australian cinemas October 10