JOY (2024)

Screenwriters Jack Thorne (Enola Holmes), Emma Gordon, and director Ben Taylor (Sex Education) dramatise the research and experimentation of the first test-tube baby. The heartwarming and quintessentially British real-life story of Joy follows the doctors, nurses, and scientists who helped conceive the first baby through in vitro fertilisation (IVF).

When Louise Joy Brown was born on 25 July 1978, she was considered a medical miracle, but some religious figures argued that scientists were playing God. Joy simplifies these conflicts into a watchable but twee drama.

The film is an ode to Jean Purdy (Thomasin McKenzie), the embryologist nurse who was the forgotten driving force behind the research. She carried out groundbreaking research while caring for her ailing, religious mother (Joanna Scanlan), yet has become a historical footnote.

Pioneering biologist Robert Edwards (James Norton), a strong-headed Cambridge scientist, battled the establishment for years. He’s joined by renegade obstetrician Dr Patrick Steptoe (Bill Nighy) and operating theatre supervisor Muriel Harris (Tanya Moodie), who runs the project like a sergeant major.

Joy smartly focuses on the women involved, cutting through the fraternity of scientists that have gone down in the history books. Jean Purdy acts as the audience surrogate, adding heart and pathos to a story where motherhood is a game of numbers and Petri dishes. It’s a shame that audiences only briefly get to know the women who bravely gave up their bodies to test early batches of IVF. By making these women more than avatars in the background of scientific experiments, their loss echoes loudly and more emotionally.

Joy unfortunately tries too hard to keep spirits up and not focus on the negative aspects. One of the women, self-proclaimed ‘The Ovum Club,’ mentions being a victim of domestic abuse while the other is told her pregnancy is ectopic, yet their heartbreak is skipped over. Instead, the film goes off on a cheerier tangent where Jean takes the women to the beach as a distraction.

Lesley Brown (Ella Bruccoleri), history’s first mother by IVF, is especially missing from proceedings. Although her role in history comes later in the timeline, her addition to the story feels strangely anticlimactic. The writing of the final act manipulates audiences into emotions, especially for those who have conceived children via IVF. The last scene is tactically set up to rinse the audience of sympathy and perhaps remind them of the joys of their own child’s birth. Without the audience bringing their own experience to proceedings, the ending is too concerned with being pleasant to give the story the sensitivity and time it deserves.

The most culturally relevant part of Joy comes with the science vs God thread. Jean battles her evangelical mother, who believes her work is malevolent. Late in the movie, Robert is hounded by the British press and labelled Dr. Frankenstein. While this thread is addressed, the movie merely wants to acknowledge that this type of religious interference with women’s healthcare is not new. Joy isn’t interested in debating big theological ideas, or reflecting modern-day political headlines regarding fertility and women’s healthcare.

Despite being based on real people, Jean and Robert never feel quite real. Young Jean is too plucky and bright-eyed ever to have broken the glass ceiling. Her almost-romantic relationship with Arun (Rish Shah) is watered down and a blip so unnecessary it was barely worthy of a mention. Her long battle with her own fertility is unevenly tackled. It’s supposed to make Jean look empathetic, but instead, it makes her appear as if all her important scientific work was self-motivated.

The writers can’t decide whether Robert is this great middle-class renegade arguing about science on Radio 4 or if he is some nice family man in a sweater mildly tutting when faced with unfair accusations. Patrick is the only lead who feels like a fully-rounded, grounded character. Played with Nighy’s characteristic quirkiness, Patrick’s wit and realism cut through the sickeningly sweet tone just when the writing needs it the most. Despite the issues with the writing, the three performances hold together the script and give the story pathos.

The film is as much about Jean as it is about the invention of IVF. Joy follows her from the bright-eyed woman applying for an assistant position through her own battles to become a mother until she becomes the pioneering backbone of one of the most revolutionary scientific breakthroughs in the last 60 years. Although it focuses heavily on her life in and out of the lab, Joy ultimately fails to get under the skin of a woman whose contribution to society was not noted until after her tragic young death from cancer, aged just 39.

Joy consistently errs on the side of cosy, committing to its tweeness no matter how dark the subject matter gets. The opening acts like a gentle comedy as Purdy, Edwards and Steptoe clash and struggle to find their work dynamic. Jamie Cairney lenses the film in a way that softens the harsh 1970s hospitals, and Sinéad Kidao’s costuming leans into snuggly knits and pleasant tweeds. The film could be compared to Call the Midwife, the BBC period drama about women’s health. Only Joy’s tone is more akin to Paddington (2017) than that popular BBC series, taking any peril, drama, or grit out of proceedings.

Sadly, Joy may have benefited from having more female voices involved. The women of the movie fall victim to the overly sentimental tone. The real story was often quite bleak, and while it was understandably softened for audiences, the women who sacrificed their hopes and their bodies to help millions of people achieve their goals of having children deserve more than a cosy Sunday night drama. The writers simplify a huge achievement of modern medicine, so it becomes a more digestible drama, eliminating the struggles of real women.

UK | 2024 | 115 MINUTES | COLOUR | ENGLISH

Cast & Crew

director: Ben Taylor.
writers: Jack Thorne & Rachel Mason (story by Emma Gordon & Shaun Topp).
starring: Bill Nighy, Thomasin McKenzie, James Norton, Joanna Scanlan, Charlie Murphy, Tanya Moodie, Ella Bruccoleri & Rish Shah.