The Iron Lady
Year: 2011
Director: Phyllida Lloyd
Stars: Meryl Streep, Jim Broadbent, Olivia Colman
Studio: Anchor Bay Entertainment / The Weinstein Company
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Running Time: 106 Mins.
After reviewing “My Week With Marlyn”, I thought Michelle Williams performance should have gotten her the Best Actress Oscar. That honor went to Meryl Streep for her performance in“The Iron Lady“, which I‘m going to talk about in a minute. I was still interested in checking out “The Iron Lady” and was wondering if Meryl Streep truly deserve that Oscar or was I right in saying that Michelle Williams should have one?
The film follows Margret Thatcher, who was one of the most controversial figures in British politics and became the first and only Prime Minister of Britain. An older Thatcher has trouble struggling with the death of her husband. As she is cleaning out his husbands old clothes, she begins to remembers the things that happened during her life. From her childhood to her rise to prime minister, she begins to recall some of those moments that‘s made her the person that she is.
“The Iron Lady” was one of those films, where it could have used a good screenplay. The direction was good. Director Phyllida Lloyd does a very good job capturing Margret Thatcher. She’s able to handle the production aspects very well. From the costume designs to the scenery, those things did a very good job capturing that time period. I also liked, how Lloyd handled the acting. The acting in this film was very good, considering that the screenplay felt flawed. She does a very good job in getting some good performances out of her cast. I thought, Streep and Jim Broadbent played there characters very well. They both tried to make the film’s story work, by making their characters interesting. That’s what made this film not become a complete failure.
Was Meryl Streep’s performance worthy of the Best Actress Oscar for this role. The answer would be a slightly no. Don’t get me wrong. Her performance in this film was good, but it isn’t as captivating enough that it would make an average film better. I like, how she gets the aspects of the Margret Thatcher down pat. Streep does her best to bring the historical figure to life. It’s the fact that she had a bad screenplay to deal with and it hurts the character a little bit.
What makes this film disappointing, the film’s screenplay. I didn’t like the approach that screenwriter Ari Morgan went with the film. The story felt more about Thatcher’s state of mind, then about herself. One of the reasons that I felt that way, it spend too much time in the present with her talking to her dead husband. It felt like the story was about Thatcher and the way she is coping with the death of her husband than a historical film on the person. It spends way too much time on that, which hurts the film and you don’t get a full historical presence on the person. The other problem that I had, the story jumped constantly from the present to the past. It made the story fall out of rhythm and made it look more like a character study than a historical film. The story jumps back and forth too much that it becomes distracting. I kept wanting to know more about her and the people around her. But sadly, that wasn’t the case. It would have made the film more interesting than leaving questions about the characters.
“The Iron Lady has a very good performance from Meryl Streep, but it’s the screenplay that ruins this film completely for me.
Review Rating: Two and a Half Stars
