Joy

This sensitive Dutch drama constructs a thought-provoking portrait of 18-year-old Joy (Samira Mass), abandoned as a baby and raised in care. The third in her trilogy of films about teenage girls, director Mijke de Jong strips out the showdowns and set-tos of social realism to find a rhythm closer to life. Joy puts on a sullen front, masking a painful sense that she is not part of the world. After tracking down an address for her mum, she spies on the house. Her Serbian boyfriend has a raucous welcoming family but Joy doesn’t know how to be around them. Time and again she drifts back to the miserable children’s home where she grew up, which after all is some kind of home. Quietly moving.