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Meryl Streep is fantastic as former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, but The Iron Lady is one big mess. Set in current times, an aging, weak, hallucinating Thatcher struggles with simple tasks, and occasionally flashes back to moments in her life when she was more powerful. She happily remembers meeting her husband, losing her first run at Parliament, and her country rallying around her during the Falkland Islands War.
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The problem with The Iron Lady is that the memories are more interesting than the story of an old woman. And anytime you find yourself getting interested in the life of a young Margaret Thatcher, the director pulls you back into an uncomfortable story, and forces you to watch the mental and physical decline of someone who could be your mother or grandmother. And there's nothing fun about that.
Instead of looking at what changed between the first and second Parliamentary runs, we see the first loss, followed immediately by a wedding engagement. Then we flash forward to modern day and watch Thatcher talk to her dead husband. By the time we get our next flashback, she has just won the next election. I would be far more interested in this movie if this so-called political biopic spent more time on politics and a comprehensive biography, as opposed to a stream-of-consciousness style partial biography blending with hallucinations.
Even in this weakly-written story, Streep truly does shine as Thatcher, picking up the character around age 30. I'm pretty confident that Streep could succeed in just about any role imaginable. She already has 16 Oscar nominations (and 2 wins) through her career, and I definitely expect that she will once again be nominated, and will have a serious chance of winning, despite the movie itself. Five stars for Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher, but only 2½ for The Iron Lady. |
