Vote 1 Meryl
February 07, 2012
By
Richard Jones
A look at The Iron Lady...
MARGARET Thatcher was a polarising influence during her remarkable tenure as Britain's Prime Minister from early May 1979 to November 1990.
In Phyllida Lloyd's biopic, long-retired Baroness Thatcher (Meryl Streep) is in the early stages of dementia, constantly surrounded by voices from her past.
Prime among them is the voice of her long-suffering but very supportive husband, Denis (Jim Broadbent).
Except, he's not there. Denis had passed away several years earlier. So although Margaret has staff around her, plus an armed guard, her sole family contact is with daughter Carol (Olivia Colman).
Director Lloyd takes us from young Margaret's induction into the local Conservative Party's organisation to winning her first seat in the House of Commons as Margaret Roberts in 1959.
Always she stays true to the ringing words of her small-businessman father (Iain Glen). "Never go with the crowd, Margaret. Go your own way."
And so we see Thatcher take her nation through the Falklands War, the 1984 miners strike, the failed IRA assassination bombing attempt at the Tory convention and ultimately German reunification when the Berlin Wall comes down.
Streep is simply extraordinary as Thatcher. The voice, the posture, the intonation and the movement are breathtakingly precise.
If she doesn't win an Oscar at this month's Academy Awards ceremony in Los Angeles, I'm giving up writing film reviews!
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