Not so Joyous Noel

Rating: 6/10 (26 December 2015)

**Warning! May Contain Spoilers**
So It's Christmas day. The house is covered in Gift Wrapping and Half eaten plates. Time to clean up you say ? Nah. Like 7,000 other holiday patrons I crammed my self into a movie seat at my local Megaplex to see Jennifer Lawrence's new flick.
Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook , American Hustle) Once again teams up with Writer/Director David O. Russell (Silver Linings Playbook , American Hustle) to present us with the movie land version of the woman that brought us the Miracle Mop. And we need it for this one.
First off Acting was fine , Including Lawrence who really carried this one, with notable help from Edgar Ramirez (Tony). A good flaky jerk father figure role by Robert De Niro was had as well.
The Writing. Well , we all saw the quirky eccentricities of David O. Russell in Silver Linings Playbook. We all saw what they did when placed in Jennifer Lawrence's Capable hands. Sometimes that formula really works well ( Big Trouble (2002)), However most of the time you get a discombobulated mess that strains your disbelief. The Writing of Joy is the latter. I Don't fault Russell too much. After all audience tastes are swinging to the more real life , authentic sort of 1970s style drama these days.
For what were undemanding locations, the filming was on par , but the writing was just splattered all over the place , thus creating a washing machine style Hurk n Jurk with the films flow.
I don't feel I wasted Christmas here , but I did not see Guardians of the Galaxy or the Shawshank Redemption either. If you are a Jennifer Lawrence Fan , or even just tired of the hunger games , this one is a good one to see.