The Iron Lady
starring Meryl Streep, Jim Broadbent and Olivia Colman
screenplay by Abi Morgan
directed by Phyllida Lloyd
Rating: ♦♦♦♦♦
I was a young adult when Margaret Thatcher became British Prime Minister and I vividly remember the whole Falkland Islands War that saved her premiership from the extremely negative domestic opinion following her closer of unprofitable coal mines. And, I remember IRA terrorist bombings in central London that killed Queen’s Guard horses in Hyde Park. Those were they days! Meryl Streep does an excellent job. The entire movie is Thatcher’s career seen in retrospect through her own, much older contemporary memory. Her husband, Dennis, an oil company executive, is played by Jim Broadbent. I knew that she was a grocer’s daughter, but I did not know that her first (failed) run for elected office was in 1950 as a 24-year-old. She was later elected to Parliament in 1959.
I am in entire agreement with Thatcher’s sentiment:
One of the great problems of our age is that we are governed by people who care more about
feelings than they do about thoughts and ideas.
Haven’t I been saying that for years? I could have been a script writer. “What we think we become.”