‘Joy’: London Review

Dir: Ben Taylor. UK. 2024. 114mins

A world-changing scientific breakthrough may touch the lives of countless individuals, but that doesn’t necessarily make for gripping cinema. Particularly when, in the case of this worthy drama exploring the painstaking research that led to the birth of the first test-tube baby in 1978, much of that science involves delving around in women’s ovaries with a terrifying metal prong and squinting through microscopes at the contents of Petri dishes.

 Solid, by-the-numbers drama

This solid, by-the-numbers drama humanises the research slightly by foregrounding the three key figures whose dedication and courage laid the foundations for IVF technology: visionary scientist Robert Edwards (James Norton), skilled but cantankerous surgeon Patrick Steptoe (Bill Nighy) and, central to the story, nurse, laboratory manager and gifted embryologist Jean Purdy (Thomasin McKenzie). But even with faces to put to the science, there is a sense that much of the film’s drama, like the pregnancies, is artificially engineered.

Joy (the picture takes its name from the first test tube baby, Louise Joy Brown) marks the feature filmmaking debut of television director Ben Taylor, who is best known for Sex Education and the Caitlin Moran and Diablo Cody-scripted TV movie Raised By Wolves. Following its premiere at the London Film Festival, where it screens as the Cunard Gala, the picture will be released in UK cinemas on November 15th, followed by a global streaming launch on Netflix. It’s perfectly watchable stuff, but, given the potentially heart-swelling subject matter, curiously lacking in emotional heft. While it digs into the ethical questions of the research and the pressures placed on the scientists – the team was subject to intense media scrutiny and accusations of “playing God” – the film rather misses a trick by failing to develop the characters of the prospective mothers to any notable degree.

By focussing on Purdy, rather than the two older men on the team, Joy redresses a fundamental imbalance and acknowledges the casual sexism that was prevalent in the scientific community at the time (the story starts with Purdy’s appointment by Edwards in 1968 and unfolds over the following decade). This, after all, was research into female fertility, and yet the contribution of the woman on the team was written out of history – a commemorative plaque mounted at the Oldham hospital where the research took place listed only Edwards’ and Steptoe’s names, until, following pressure from Edwards, it was later amended to include Purdy as an equal research partner.

But Purdy as a character is more than a lightning rod for issues of gender inequality. A devout Christian who is rejected by her congregation and, for a time, estranged from her mother (Joanna Scanlan) because of her involvement in IVF research, she is also on the frontline of the ethical battlefield. And as a sufferer of severe endometriosis, she has a personal investment in the success of the research. It’s quite a weight for a single character to carry, and one that McKenzie’s somewhat glum and harried performance doesn’t always fully convey.

Moments of tension in the story are clearly signposted by Steven Price’s efficient, businesslike score that bustles around the film in much the same way that Tanya Moodie’s formidable Matron patrols the hospital. Elsewhere, the production values are of high quality, with the film’s period evoked vividly through everything from evocative costume choices to Formica-adorned café interiors and the distinctive quality of the light – there’s a greenish strip-lit hue to scenes in the hospital that practically screams 1970s institutional disillusionment. But the picture’s main asset is Nighy, who is terrific as the curmudgeonly surgeon who conceals the kindest of hearts under his sandpaper line readings and thunderous scowl.