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Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Don't listen to the negative reviews

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

An elderly Margaret Thatcher talks to the imagined presence of her recently deceased husband as she struggles to come to terms with his death while scenes from her past life, from girlhood to British prime minister, intervene. Without a doubt the best part of 'The Iron Lady' is easily Meryl Streep's amazing and terrific perfomance but unfortunately? Besides that? There isn't anything much to it except her role and her devotion to the film plus the make up was insane but the film and the rest of the casting? Was pretty damn forgettable and below average.

Sometimes a movie should be about the person, not the history. That is what a lot of people are missing. This is a unique chance to make a movie about someone well known who has dementia and how it might manifest itself in them. We saw Margaret as a politician, but not as a person who had trials of her own. I disliked her politics and really didn't want her policies lauded and praised, but it was interesting to see the woman herself.

It seems we can't just can't have a normal biographical movie anymore without flashbacks. The flashback style is done for the purpose of showing us how events in someone's past effected their later decisions. Seeing the retired senile Margaret Thatcher was really unnecessary to this film. Can you imagine a Reagan biography starting out with a senile Reagan not knowing he is no longer president and talking to dead people? Unfortunately the senility scenes are needed so we can get to know the character of Marget Thatcher because the main biography part is poorly done with an over abundance of "red meat" sound bites.To make matters worse, the film then employs this technique during the flashback so there is a flashback within the flashback.I liked the young Margaret Roberts (Alexandra Roach) growing up in a man's world where the expectations of women were to stay out of business and politics. Her bucking the system was inspirational and it would have been a better film had we seen more of this and less of Margaret thinking her husband was still alive.The meat of the film picks up when she is the Education Secretary of the conservative party. England is facing a union strike crippling the nation. Marget doesn't like her party's leadership and decides to run for the leader of the Conservative Party. She correctly places herself in the hands of professions who tweak her for national appeal, including working on her shrill voice...but she keeps the pearls.The movie relates to today. England was in a recession and people couldn't pay their mortgage. Margret wanted to cut government spending in the midst of a recession contrary to everyone else, including her own party who worries about re-election. I expected to see a "Paid for by Ron Paul" after that speech.For me, the film becomes watchable when Thatcher has to weigh her decision to go to war over the Falkland Islands. Streep gives us some wonderful performances. But when I see Matthew Marsh miscast as Alexander Haig, I have to ask, "What were they thinking?"I went into this film thinking "5 stars" but reality set in as they killed this film on the editing floor. Horrifically edited and badly written. Whose idea was it really to have Streep walk around in an old house coat with messed up hair looking acting like Edith Bunker? The scenes of Streep moving through a crowd of faces, speaking her thoughts was another idea that failed. The soundtrack during the file footage scenes was terrible. Streep had a few strong scenes, but not enough to save this film. My advice: read the book.No f-bombs, no sex, brief nudity on file footage.

"Iron Lady" opens with a CCTV - style view from above the counter of a convenience store where a frail -looking old lady in a mackintosh and headscarf is faffing around and muttering to herself as she buys a carton of milk. As the camera moves in we see that this is not in fact a frail old lady but Hollywood Great Meryl Streep pretending to be a frail old lady and bent double under the weight of facial prosthetics. She then pretends tp shuffle along the street,looking like nothing more than Julie Walters pretending to be a frail,mad old lady. And so it goes on,Miss Streep in varying degrees of Margaret Thatcher make - up and giving a technically assured but mannered and rather cold performance that is bound to please her many admirers. This is mainly about Mrs T's sad descent into dementia in her later years and viewed as such is competently but in no way outstandingly made. Miss Streep may look like Margaret Thatcher but she fails capture her.That is left to the estimable Miss Alexandra Roach who captures Margaret Roberts in her somewhat gauche persona,a blank page to a certain extent to be a willing subject of the Svengali - like Denis. As she loses touch with reality she sees her late husband as a clownish figure in a continuing fantasy and the film ends with Denis walking out of the door in his socks. How much of "The Iron Lady" is truth I do not pretend to know and it is unlikely to persuade pro or anti factions to change their opinions of this ultimately sad figure. Personally I consider the film not to be as good as its proponents nor as bad as its detractors. If you are a Streepomane you will love it.