Not that great

Rating: 6/10 (29 January 2016)

I like the wry humour of the family in Joy. The pacing is good. And Jennifer Lawrence is a very appealing actor, who is good at playing the steely, independent female hero. It seems to be all she plays. But although Joy is inoffensive, I don't think there's enough passion in the story to elevate this film above others. For one thing, it's way too similar in setting to Silver Linings Playbook. Of course Robert De Niro, as Joy's Dad, and Bradley Cooper, as the TV shopping channel manager, were also in Silver Linings with Lawrence. Fun for them, but a bit boring for the audience. The character Joy has a very caustic, critical family who rely on her for everything, but they do love her. But the film seems to say that in order to succeed in life, you have to be spectacularly successful in business. It's quite a materialistic view of the world. The garish, money-soaked TV shopping channel world here is seen as something quite normal. I guess for Joy it was the best way of getting her products to market, but it's not very heartwarming. The film is about how anyone living in some working class suburb with a lot of obstacles in her way can succeed with a lot if hard work and determination. It's kind of like a long advertisement for the American dream. But maybe Silver Linings Playbook was more convincing because it was about people who succeeded on a more humble, realistic level.