Tyler Perry has spread his fictional wings in recent years beyond Atlanta, taking a historical trip to Europe during World War II (Netflix’s “The Six Triple Eight”), tackling White House shenanigans in Washington (BET’s “The Oval”) and digging into the cosmetics world of Chicago (Netflix’s “Beauty in Black”).
Now he’s located a movie largely to the snow-capped mountains of Colorado for the romantic film “Finding Joy” on Amazon, which came out Wednesday.
The Rocky Mountains are not foreign turf for Perry despite his New Orleans roots and longtime residence in Atlanta: He built a vacation log cabin in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, in 1995. In a 2019 interview with Ellen DeGeneres, he recounted meeting a grizzly bear and a moose in his backyard.
You will see a moose in “Finding Joy,” which centers around Joy (Shannon Thornton), a frustrated New York City fashion designer whose boss steals her designs and calls them her own.
To make matters worse, she is terrible at picking partners and flies to Colorado for a man who is clearly not that into her.
Finding out she has been had, Joy tries to fly back to New York City, but an impending snowstorm means no flights are available. So she rents a two-wheel vehicle to drive back to New York City and gets trapped in the storm. She ends up in an isolated cabin owned by Ridge (Tosin Morohunfola), who harbors his own personal issues regarding his late mom and estrangement from his dad.
Ridge has no phone or internet access and shoots rabbits and other animals for food. Trapped by the storm for a week, Ridge and Joy are forced to get to know each other.
“She is sharing space with someone used to being by themselves,” said Thornton, who first worked with Perry in his 2024 thriller “Mea Culpa” in a supporting role. “It feels like she’s disrupting his peace, and there are moments where she doesn’t seem very grateful.”
But since this is a romance, their guards eventually go down and Joy’s skepticism melts along with her heart.
Credit: Photo: Courtesy of Prime © AMAZON CONTENT SERVICES LLC
Credit: Photo: Courtesy of Prime © AMAZON CONTENT SERVICES LLC
In the meantime, her close friends Ashley (Brittany S. Hall) and loose-lipped, pot-smoking Littia (newcomer Inayah) can’t reach her and begin hunting for her, worried she might be dead. Their scenes are largely set up for comic relief.
“The three of us are earth, wind and fire,” said Hall, who lives in Atlanta. “Joy is the wind. Littia is the fire. I’m the earth, the reasonable one.”
Thornton, who also stars in the Starz drama “P-Valley,” had to endure no shortage of chilly outdoor scenes, including a comedic one in an outhouse and one involving her getting stuck outside her car as the snowstorm bears down on her.
“They had this huge fan, and my hair is going every which way,” she said.
Thornton said she enjoyed working with Perry. “He’s a man in charge. He knows what he wants. He comes in on a mission and you can only respect that. He’s also so tall!” (Perry is 6 foot 5 inches.)
Credit: Photo: Courtesy of Prime © AMAZON CONTENT SERVICES LLC
Credit: Photo: Courtesy of Prime © AMAZON CONTENT SERVICES LLC
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