Bouncing Babies and Love on the Fertile Frontier

It’s the wake of Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, we’re likely to see a slew of follow-ups based on similar stories that will capitalize on audiences’ interest in biographical films of those who made great breakthroughs in the world of science. Netflix’s Joy, from director Ben Taylor, although it chronicles a development in science, takes a wildly different approach from Nolan’s “Great Man” epic. The story of the three people who worked tirelessly for over a decade to find a cure for “childlessness” (or as we know it today, IVF) is one of, naturally, heightened emotions. The film includes the “playing God” anxieties and rage that the public, government, church, and medical community threw at the team, considering them Dr. Frankenstein types. It’s two hours of highs and lows, as each step towards changing the world comes with three steps backward.

A story dealing with such personal, sensitive subject matter requires a particularly careful approach and not the epic, foreboding route that movies like Oppenheimer have taken. It’s too focused on offering a family-friendly, happy-go-lucky tale of human perseverance that it feels ignorant to the real-world plights of infertility and the toll scientific research takes on people devoting their entire lives to a goal that may never be reached. Every low blow only lasts a few seconds before a Dooby Brothers song plays and the scientists seem all too ready to crack a joke and keep on working. It results in an overly sentimental, mannerly British comedy as if the script took inspiration from a P.G. Wodehouse novel rather than a real-life story of groundbreaking medical pursuits and an arduous decades-long journey to get there.

‘Joy’ Follows the Real-Life Story of the Development of IVF

One of the great credits to the movie has to be its decision to tell it from the perspective of the woman at the center of this story, nurse Jean Purdy (Thomasin McKenzie). It’s through her introduction, though, that we first meet the forcefulness of the movie’s whimsical tone, as we’re spoonfed Jean’s quirky and spunky demeanor because she has a hole in her tights and she has not one, but two toes on show! Oh, Jean! She’s immediately given a job (because, remember, she’s spunky) in the lab of Dr. Bob Edwards (James Norton), a visionary doctor who’s had success in harvesting eggs from hamsters and mice, fertilizing the egg outside of the body, and then implanting the eggs back in the hamster, leading to pregnancy. Bob is adamant about getting Patrick Stepoe (Bill Nighy), a pioneering doctor in reproductive medicine on his team to carry out the procedure of removing and implanting the eggs. After a friendly and conveniently quick drink, the three agree to set up shop in the dilapidated wing of Oldham Hospital to begin research and trials.

The remainder of the runtime, jumping throughout the years from 1968 to 1978, follows Jean’s personal reckoning with her position as a Christian with an extremely devout mother, who quickly cuts her out for trying to “Play God.” Bob must face the public and their tirades against his interfering with nature, as many believe the babies will be born with abnormalities. Meanwhile, Patrick must accept that part of his job comes with the unsettling power to decide who receives treatment and who doesn’t. We meet several women whose lives would be transformed by this medicine, and the stakes for the three become increasingly more personal, especially for Jean.

Joy premiered at this year’s BFI London Film Festival.