Joyless

Rating: 6/10 (20 January 2016)

JOY is a "joyless" picture. Director David O. Russell paints a world of people who's first words upon hearing of a new idea is "no". Plucked into the middle of this "joylessness" is JOY (Jennifer Lawrence) a "can do" person with a mind filled with ideas. Can she overcome this environment of negativeness and achieve her goals and dreams?
This character is played by Jennifer Lawrence, what do you think?
Lawrence has been nominated for the 4th time for an Oscar on the strength on her being the only true bright spot in this movie. This is the 3rd time that she has been nominated while being directed by David O. Russell and, clearly, there is a "chemistry" between these two. She obviously trusts him and he is able to draw out strong performances from her.
I only wish this movie was up to her performance.
As I said, Joy is dropped in this world of negative, populated by strong actors like Virginia Madsen, Isabella Rosellini and, most importantly, Robert DeNiro. It's good to see that he still knows how to act and not just clown around in sex comedies (but that's a topic for a different day). Unfortunately, I didn't want to spend time in the middle of these negative people. They weren't interesting, they were just negative and that got (at least for me) draining after awhile. Maybe that was director Russell's point. If so, I got it.
The only other bright spot in this film is the work Bradley Cooper, who shows up for 3 brief (but welcome) scenes. I used the word "chemistry" earlier and that would be a word that I would use for the pairing of Lawrence and Cooper. Lawrence's performance was strong but positively radiated when she was playing off of Cooper. Unfortunately, these scenes are too few and far between to save this movie. I'd sure like to see a movie with these two playing off each other. Oh yes! SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK and American HUSTLE exists.
See this movie for Lawrence, the rest will be an endurance test.
6 (out of 10) stars and you can take that to the Bank (of Marquis)