Poor, poor Maggie Thatcher. Finally, some vindication from the artsy left by way of this terribly hagiographic biopic, and yet Great Britain’s former prime minister is now too batty to enjoy it. Oh well. More’s the pity because, whatever one’s politic viewpoint, there’s much to enjoy here, thanks mainly to a brilliant, bang-on central performance by Meryl Streep as The Iron Lady.
The Academy does love a good impersonation, and this year it had two exceptional ones from which to choose—Michelle Williams as Marilyn Monroe in My Week with Marilyn, and Streep, among an otherwise strong women’s field (Glenn Close, Viola Davis and Rooney Mara). But the nomination went to Streep because one of the greatest female actors of her generation hasn’t won since 1982’s Sophie’s Choice and this is her most brilliant impersonation in a career marked by brilliant impersonations—Karen Silkwood, Karen Blixen, Julia Child (let us conveniently ignore Lindy Chamberlain). Streep doesn’t so much channel her inner Margaret as radiate her; whether she’s playing the older, post-politics, demented Thatcher who talks to her doting husband, who appears as an apparition, or the younger, ball-breaking incarnation who, as Britain’s first female prime minister, dominated her male-dominated cabinet as She Who Must Be Obeyed.
There are a few problems, however: the script by Abi Morgan (TV’s Birdsong) spends too much time with the mental Maggie, and not nearly enough time when she was prime minister; Richard E. Grant (Withnail and I) as the usurping Michael Heseltine is a wasted bit of casting (he has just two lines of dialogue in which the Tarzan wig does most of the acting). This is Phyllida Lloyd’s second turn directing Streep, following 2008’s Mamma Mia!, and while it’s not a perfect film by any stretch, Streep’s performance is perfection.