Movie Review: "The Iron Lady"

Theatrical release poster, courtesy of the Weinstein Company

For the first time in much too long, my umbilical chord to the UT campus was cut this evening as I FINALLY went to go see "The Iron Lady," after weeks of having a burning but, until now, unsatisfied desire to do so. My first thought after seeing the film is the obvious one: Meryl Streep, to quote one of Lady Thatcher's advisors in the film, "looked absolutely magnificent." I would be hard-pressed to think of an actress more vibrant and capable of capturing the truth of seemingly any character that she sets her mind to portraying, than Streep. If you had told me after I saw "Julie and Julia" that it was physically possible for Meryl Streep to ever pull off an even more convincing performance (portraying a much more divisive and complicated figure than Julia Child, no less), I would have dismissed you with Thatcher-esque certainty of myself, but pull it off Streep does nonetheless, and she very well could (and should) win her third Academy Award for it.

My opinion of the film itself, like that of the Prime Minister whose story it tells, is more complicated- due in no small part to its choice of what was probably an over-complicated plot device: that of an elderly Thatcher who is battling senility and seeing visions of her deceased, beloved husband Dennis, letting the audience in on her story in the form of flashbacks almost reminiscent of ABC's "Lost." The film's makeup department delivered a pitch-perfect performance in transforming Streep into an octogenarian in the scenes set in the present, but some of the flashbacks felt out of place and, particularly in the film's beginning, almost confusing (not at all unlike "Lost"- well, except for the fact that there was no actual time travel or a smoke monster that eats humans involved).

The film's treatment of Thatcher also feels contradictory at times- she is neither heroine nor villainess. Which Thatcher should I take away from the film- the obviously devoted and loving wife and mother, or the supremely ambitious, demanding, and sometimes cruel political taskmaster? The answer isn't clear, but it rarely is in life, is it not? Almost no one is pure evil or pure good, and I actually appreciate the film for refusing to attempt to pigeon-hole a figure as complex as Thatcher into either category. True, less ambitious viewers than I might fault the Iron Lady for placing such a high priority on her career and conviction that it was her destiny to have a "life that matters," but as someone with political aspirations myself, I was sympathetic to (or at least understanding of) Thatcher's sureness of herself, and her conflicting emotions at having to sacrifice some of the joys of private life in exchange for a shot at public greatness and making change in the world. It's a fascinating story, and one worthy of Streep's always masterful performance. Three and a half stars out of five.