Joker director Todd Phillips has reacted to his film receiving 11 Oscar nominations.
The 49-year-old director posted to his Instagram account to celebrate the news. In the post, he mentioned what he wanted Joker to explore and thanked everybody who worked on the film, including actor Joaquin Phoenix.
"Joker began as an idea, an experiment really— could we take an 'indie approach' to a studio film by inverting it into a character study to reflect the world around us?" Phillips wrote in his post. "Explore what we’re seeing and feeling in society, from the lack of empathy to the effects of the absence of love. I am deeply honored by the overwhelming recognition of the Academy this morning, and I want to thank the genius that is Joaquin Phoenix, and all my incredible collaborators. We are beyond humbled that our peers in the filmmaking community have embraced the film and its message."
Joker's 11 Oscar nominations include Best Picture, Best Director for Todd Phillips and Best Actor for Joaquin Phoenix. Other nominations include Best Adapted Screenplay, Film Editing and Cinematography.
Joker's competitors for Best Picture includes Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, The Irishman, Marriage Story and 1917. Joker joins Black Panther as the second comic book movie to earn a Best Picture nomination. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, based on the Spider-Man comics, won the award for Best Animated Feature in 2019.
The 92nd Academy Awards ceremony airs Sunday, Feb. 9 on ABC.
Joker stars Joaquin Phoenix, Robert De Niro, Zazie Beetz, Bill Camp, Frances Conroy, Brett Cullen, Glenn Fleshler, Douglas Hodge, Marc Maron, Josh Pais and Shea Whigham. The film is currently available on Digital HD, Blu-ray, 4K UHD and DVD.