Joy

I recently moved, not far, just a couple of towns up the road. While in the midst of my move, my granddaughter picked up a baggie and asked, “Grandma, what are these?”  What she was holding in her hand was a plastic bag chocked full of film negatives. For a moment I didn’t understand the question and then I realized, “the times, they are a changing”.  Dark rooms are a thing of the past as even professional photographers are sitting down at their computers.

Joy is an interesting character study but it is also about a changing world.  As bricks and mortar building costs are going higher and higher, business is moving to a different model. 

Joy is an American biographical comedy-drama film, written and directed by David O. Russell and starring Jennifer Lawrence as Joy Mangano, a self-made millionaire who created her own business empire. In 1989, Joy Mangano is a divorced mother of two, working behind a desk for Eastern Airlines. (I think that’s about the time I got stranded in Haiti when Eastern went on strike!)  Joy lives with her young children, her mother Terri, and her grandmother Mimi. Oh yes, her ex-husband Tony is living in the basement. 

Her parents are divorced and can’t be in the same room without broken stuff flying through the air and Tony usually comes back between wives.  In a few words, Joy’s life is full of not enough money or time to take care of the all the people depending on her.  Her Mom spends her life in bed watching soap operas and avoiding the world. 

The always entertaining Robert De Niro plays Rudy Mangano, Joy’s father who owns a truck and bus shop. After divorcing his third wife, Rudy starts dating Trudy, a wealthy Italian widow with a little business experience who becomes her investor. While on her yacht someone drops a glass of red wine on the precious deck and everyone calls for Joy to “fix it” like she does with everything in their lives. She cuts her hands and voila, she has an idea for a revolutionary mop which spurs her on to QVC glory.

QVC was a fledgling company offering a different business model.  Just turn on your TV and you can buy virtually anything you want if you sit in your Lazy Boy long enough.  Overpriced?  Probably, but you never have to go out in the snow in the winter or heat in the summer ever again. You can mop that floor with your very clever mop in your diamond necklace and fancy robe.

Bradley Cooper plays Neil Walker, a seasoned merchandising guy in charge of the amazing new venture where celebrities sell entrepreneur’s products through a telethon system.  The first try, the host doesn’t understand her mop and the segment bombs.  Joy begs for another opportunity and insists on doing the selling herself.  She sells 50,000 Miracle Mops in just a few minutes and she’s on her way!

Joy has some tough times learning to become a businesswoman with manufacturers cheating her and trying to steal her patents. She survives. She thrives. As I hang my blouse on a weird hanger that actually holds tight and get my jewelry out of the box hanging on my closet door, I say, “Thank you, Joy.”

Joy is not the most brilliant film I’ve watched but is definitely interesting enough for a Thursday evening as what they’re selling on the many shopping channels you purchased last Thursday night.  As always, I welcome your comments at chastings@rockcliff.com.