Red Joan is a drama adaptation of a novel about the titular woman who gave nuclear secrets to the USSR, and the British government did not discover until she was elderly. The story is a heavily fictionalized account of the real-life story of Melita Norwood, which I was unfamiliar with before this movie. The film explores her life as a young woman and her motivations for betraying her country. Sophia Cookson played Joan during her early years, and Judi Dench played her during her later years.
Red Joan’s preview was heavily aired in theaters before it premiered, but I knew that I would not see it in theaters because even though Dench is wonderful, I felt as if I would not be into the movie and thought that it felt more like a PBS film, not a theatrical release. I watched it on DVD as soon as it was available for home viewing, and because it was loosely based on a true story, mom watched the movie with me.
Red Joan has two intersecting storylines-the discovery of her clandestine activities and the story of what led her to betray her country as a young woman. The movie sets out to humanize its leading lady as it did in Official Secrets by creating a portrait of a young, smart and normal woman placed in unbelievable circumstances with the opportunity to save the soul of her nation at great personal sacrifice and cost. While I was watching the film, I appreciated how it toyed with the idea of what a honey pot would be for a woman and considered if she had political ideological motivations before landing on a woman of principal who wanted to save the world. After I read a little about Norwood, I was ready to flip a table.
Red Joan managed to mimic in its narrative what happened in real life. She got the white woman treatment and enjoyed a double standard of not just getting away with violating the law, but writers bending over backwards to reframe her as the smartest, most beautiful, most noble woman as opposed to her male counterparts who are arrested and denounced as traitors. Movies are so frustrating because there seems to be an equation that woman automatically equals good, not person with good or bad characteristics. I am not saying that you cannot have a movie based on Norwood’s life that does not view her favorably or emphatically, but it wants to completely erase any scintilla of wrongdoing and make her retroactively right. This movie is incredibly polarizing in its image of women—they are noble or conniving, there is no moral complexity.
The titular character is a brilliant, innovative physicist responsible for creating the atomic bomb. Red Joan creates sympathy for her by showing the sexist treatment that she receives as she matures in her profession whereas in real life Norwood dropped out of college, which is not to say that she did not face sexism or was not smart because she managed not to get caught as a spy for decades, but she actually studied Latin and logic at the University College of Southampton not physics at Cambridge and never contributed to the development of one of the most devastating weapons in existence, which is a considerable step up from philosophy major. Joan is above politics in either extreme whereas Norwood was an actual Communist. We just have some randomly principled chick loose in this film.
To be fair, while I watched Red Joan in blissful ignorance, I enjoyed it, but I would not say that the period piece captured my imagination or kept me riveted. I am glad that I did not pay to see it. Cookson really impressed me because she clearly changed her voice to resemble Dench’s voice. The movie really rests on Cookson’s shoulders so if you are coming for Dench, lower your expectations accordingly. Tereza Srbova as Sonya stole every scene, and I kind of wanted the movie to be about her because she is so memorable. Whenever she appeared, the movie felt as if it was going in a more grounded, realistic, retro Alias direction, which was delightful. Unfortunately her appearance is also a trope-liberal colleges will convert your kids into libtards.
Red Joan is implicitly dominated with one question-who is the baby daddy, and which guy did she choose? While I appreciate that the protagonist was above getting ensnared by masculine wiles and was not made brain dead in love, I did find it mildly misogynistic how the paternity of her son subliminally dominates the story and is the real denouement of the film. This fascination is a concern for men, not women. Men are the ones secretly plagued with doubt and are most relieved with the invention of the genetic marker test. Women know. For a film that is supposed to be about a historical figure making a huge mark on the international stage, the real test of her morality is did the bitch lie to her husband about the kid? While the film is definitely sex positive in the way that Joan can be a nerd with more than one partner, it is also a dash young teen novel in the way that it sets up a love triangle. In real life, Norwood was married way earlier and had no such qualms. The filmmakers were more comfortable addressing one gender-based betrayal, but not an objectively, gender neutral, sober minded, pioneering betrayal. It is so insulting.
You can disagree with my interpretation of the dominating question in Red Joan, but it arose in my mind because her adult son is such an integral part of the capture section. Is her son a lawyer? Even if he is, what a coincidence that he is the kind of lawyer that cam represent his mom in such a specific area of law. Also is it a good idea for him to represent her considering how emotionally involved he is in her plight? Otherwise how else to explain that he gets to be present during the interrogation. If I had not seen Official Secrets, I would not know how difficult it is to get representation, and for that attorney to get information to mount a reasonable defense for their client. It strained my suspension of disbelief and signaled the true momentum of the story-romantic entanglements and the consequences.
While Red Joan may explicitly denounce sexism, it traffics in the most sexist narrative techniques by sacrificing a story that should have tackled a morally questionable, ideological decision and morphed it into a Harlequin romance set in a lab. Women are not just heroines in history. Sadly for women to be seen as people, we have to be capable of seeing them as villains or at least compromised as we see men. Definitely watch it if you follow Cookson’s career, otherwise skip it.
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While watching Red Joan, I actually thought the protagonist is dumb. I understand being concerned that only one country will dominate the weapon market, but she invented mutually assured destruction? GTFOH. It would seem more plausible that instead of increasing the proliferation of weapons, she would try to sabotage the advances first. The story is just plain idiotic.
