The Iron Lady Movie review

Posted: October 17th, 2013

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The Iron Lady Movie review

The movie, Iron Lady, was based on the life story of Margret Thatcher, one of the prime ministers in the United Kingdom. Most of the viewers who saw the movie went into the theaters and cinema halls having strong opinions since the movie had clear political themes. The role of Mrs. Thatcher was played by Meryl Streep. Other major roles in the movie include that of her deputy, Geoffrey Howe and her husband, Denis Thatcher. The movie had a very powerful cast, as the role of Margaret Thatcher required the actor to express many strong emotions such as anger, disgust and arrogance.

The plot of the movie starts with the tragedy of the Islamabad hotel bombing and the entry of Thatcher who was by then, a discrete and humble elderly woman suffering from dementia. Her professional and family life is depicted as having being disrupted by the major role she played in the politics for her country. She has difficulties reaching out to her two children and even her husband. The movie employs a flashback to show Thatcher as a young woman working in Grantham, her graduation from Oxford and her struggle within the Tory Party and later, the Conservative Party. Her tenure as prime minister of the United Kingdom was also included in the flashback where Thatcher attempts to solve the rising unemployment rates, the miners’ strike and her foreign policy. The movie returns to the present where Thatcher is now an aging woman trying to run a disintegrating Cabinet. At last, he pressure to resign gets to her and the movie ends with her relaxing at her home.

The film was an overall success but the scenes containing Margaret Thatcher appeared to give out a different perception than that experienced by people who came into close contact with the former Prime minister. The film portrayed Thatcher as a courageous amateur challenging a male-dominated sector and successfully conquering the politics of United Kingdom. However, the focus on Thatcher ended at the point and none of the features and milestones that made her an exclusive and fearsome individual were illustrated for instance the fact that Margaret Thatcher managed to salvage the economy from the IMF debt and place her country in an economically stable position. The film glided over this and other events without much analysis for the viewers to digest. Her interests in chemistry, law and even her training as a barrister were not remotely mentioned. .Instead, the movie focused on Thatcher’s recent poor physical condition in a move that would perhaps conjure sympathy.

The roles by the supporting cast were well executed with Antony Head taking the prize for the best impersonation of Sir Geoffrey Howe. With the strong cast and the wide publicity, the Iron Lady was expected to have dominant political themes as well as displays of typical behavior between the prime minister, Thatcher and different entities. Instead, the movie focuses on the drama and sorrow of her private life. In her old age, watched over by professional guardians, she trifles about in a miasma of senile reminiscence, occasionally drawn back into the magnificence and pain of the history.

In essence, the movie miserably tried to condense Margaret Thatcher’s life story into 1 hour and 45 minutes without much success. The film ended up distorting the real chain of events in history that made up Margaret Thatcher the famous and perceptive politician and parent. In the Iron Lady, Thatcher comes out as something she did not set out to be: a feminist. Thatcher deserved to be analyzed because she had a right approach toward many national and international situations, and performed her public obligations despite frenzied mistreatment from most of the political and media sectors. The film manages to compress British history, economic and social disorder into a production that represents the processes rather than the policies that Margret Thatcher adopted.