Four years after Joaquin Phoenix won the Best Actor Oscar for his psychological thriller Joker, its sequel is set to hit the silver screen across Chinese mainland on Wednesday.

The new film, Joker: Folie a Deux, sees Phoenix reprising his role as the titular character, Arthur Fleck, and Lady Gaga as Lee Quinzel, a psychiatry student who is from a wealthy family in New York. The plot focuses on Fleck's internal battle with his dual personas as the struggling comedian and the notorious Joker, intertwining with his romance with Quinzel amid his imprisonment at Arkham State Hospital.

The film premiered in Beijing on Monday, with the cinema adorned to replicate an iconic staircase scene, attracting many local fans enthusiastically to capture photographs.