The Iron Lady

The Iron Lady (2011) generated controversy far outweighing its critical reception and box office performance. It's a testament to how polarizing Maggie Thatcher remains that this movie was heavily protested and boycotted in Britain, with hardly anyone bothering to actually see it. One of my college professors once called Thatcher his least favorite person of the 20th Century!

As someone largely ignorant of the Thatcher era I cannot judge The Iron Lady on versimilitude. Its portrait of Thatcher is fairly compelling, and Meryl Streep gives an excellent turn. But it's fairly typical biopic stuff, celebrating Thatcher while superficially treating her policies and politics.

Margaret Thatcher (Meryl Streep) grows from a grocer's daughter in post-WWII London to the head of Britain's Conservative Party. Smart, feisty and resolute, Thatcher overcomes the scorn and patronization of her peers and becomes Britain's Prime Minister in 1977. Thatcher's economic policies generate angry backlash, but her victory in the Falklands War against Argentina shoots her popularity into the stratosphere. Eventually though, continued economic difficulty and distrust within her own party lead to Thatcher's ouster.

Director Phyllida Lloyd presents The Iron Lady as Oliver Stone-lite. Lloyd employs the same jerky narrative style, frantic editing and liberal use of stock footage as Nixon, without the political posturing. The flashback structure grated on this viewer, with Maggie's dementia-induced hallucinations of hubby Dennis (Jim Broadbent) growing tiresome. Once the story properly started it grows compelling, if a bit shallow.

Iron Lady views Thatcher as a generally admirable person, politics aside. Writer Abi Morgan depicts Maggie as a tough cookie, insecure about her background, looked down upon by male politicos and never taken seriously. Her steely resolve and determination in the face of habitual condescension certainly comes off well. Thatcher's only fault here is growing too big for her own boots, leading to the unprecedented step of her own party ousting her. In this incarnation though, I couldn't help comparing her to Richard Nixon, a similarly resentful striver turned conservative icon.

Viewers like me won't learn much about the Thatcher era. The movie skims over most of her tenure as PM, showing troubles with the IRA, the Falklands War, the fall of the Iron Curtain and economic turmoil without explaining any of it. A figure as polarizing as Thatcher needs some exploration and analysis beyond slogans. Perhaps Lloyd and Morgan wished to skirt controversy while focusing on Thatcher personally, an understandble biopic expedient. Given the film's reception though, they didn't really succeed.

Meryl Streep won another Oscar for her performance. Her Maggie is more likeable than the real thing but Streep's striking resemblance and layered performance are remarkable. Streep handles the character very well as the social climber, the tough party leader, the abrasive PM and the doddering old woman. Good show.

The Iron Lady is an entertaining but superficial movie. A film that probed more deeply into Thatcher's policies and beliefs would have been better but this is a decent-enough try.