Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady

Another year, another nomination, another record. Meryl Streep received her seventeenth Oscar nomination for playing Margaret Thatcher, the controversial British PM in Phyllida Llyod's movie, The Iron Lady. Each and every year when Meryl is nominated there's a point (=the Golden Globes) where everybody believes that it's Meryl's year after all. However, there's always the SAG which she loses (I guess if she hadn't won for Doubt, she would have won for Julie & Julia) and then she misses the Oscar as well. Bafta may help her a bit, but I suspect that Michelle is a bigger threat for Bafta (and the Oscar) than we imagine. And finally I'm VERY happy to say that Meryl got her third Oscar. :) 

The Iron Lady is heavily criticised as a movie, and while I see the point of the haters, I should also add that I actually enjoyed it while it lasted. Sure, Phyllida Lloyd has a lot to learn as a director, but her work improved considerably since her previous dreadful effort, Mamma Mia!. It's an accurate movie when it comes to historical facts though I'm not so sure about the scenes showing Thatcher's private life. Jim Broadbent plays the weirdest role you can possibly imagine.

However, the movie mostly felt like it was made so that Meryl can finally win her third Oscar. I really don't know, either what she has to do to win that award. There's always someone, who's more due or whose movie is loved more and somehow Meryl is forced to the second place. I think she should have won her third for her Julia Child (I know that many disagree, let's not get into that) at the very least. And here we go again, two years later, another biopic, another nod and another loss coming even though now she had what worked for everybody else: movie about a British politician.

Margaret Thatcher is already a divisive figure in politics: some consider her the greatest British politician since Churchill, some say she's the Antichrist. There's nobody who's immune to Margaret Thatcher and it was up to Meryl to use this. I suppose nobody can be indifferent to this performance. I suppose it serves the supporters and the haters of Mrs. Thatcher as well. Meryl's clearly not judgemental; she's trying to ignore politics as much as possible and we don't see a politician from a certain party, we actually see a woman who happens to be a politician. The centre of Meryl's performance is actually the womanhood of Mrs. Thatcher. The seemingly cold-hearted woman has a much softer side: it's a heartbreaking moment when she has to deal with the death of her soldiers and decides to write to the mothers. Meryl wonderfully shows the more sympathetic side of her character (or as some would say, the woman behind the monster). 

From an actress of Meryl Streep's calibre, you would expect a complete transformation to the character she's playing. Meryl (as always) fulfills all the expactations in the technical part of the character: she nails the accent, the mannerisms, the walk, everything that you see on the outside of Margaret Thatcher. That's clearly no surprise considering Meryl's filmography, it was really the inner world of Mrs. Thatcher that was exciting and really challenging for her. We first get to see her as a broken-down old woman, shopping. She's slow, unable to keep up with the world (literally, too). And the best thing is when the technical and emotional side come together: she expresses so much with just walking.

The most wonderful thing about this performance was that Meryl Streep indeed disappeared in this part. As I was sitting in my chair, I actually had to remind myself that it's Meryl that I'm looking at. Her transformation is almost as terrific as Marion Cotillard's was (though Meryl doesn't get such a dynamite of a character). She's so incredibly authentic and believable as Margaret Thatcher that she's almost more "Thatcher" than the real one. :)

In this transformation, Meryl successfully hid her own joyous, fun and playful self. As Julia Child, Meryl was very much present (and some hate it, personally, I felt it made that character even more beautiful), but here we don't get to see the Meryl Streep we all know (and love). It must have been really difficult for her to play someone with absolutely no sense of humor.

The scenes with the old Margaret and her dead husband are incredibly painful to watch, especially their last scene together. Although they were written in a very chesy and sentimental way, I kept marveling at Meryl's skills to turn them into something utterly real and heartbreaking.

Meryl also successfully avoided being completely laughable in the "Iron Lady" parts where she shows Maggie as a ruthless and harsh leader. The "cowardice" and "I have done battle" scenes are on the verge of completely ruining all the things that Meryl achieved. Meryl, however, never went too much over the top with her and she was able to seem tough and really powerful instead of hysterical and bitchy.

Meryl amazingly develops her character. All the wonderful depths and layers that she shows are just magnificent. After watching this movie, you really feel like knowing Maggie Thatcher in person. Meryl lets us observe this woman along with her and it was just a fascinating journey along with her. I just felt like knowing such intimate details about her.

My only problem with this performance is that it's not groundbreaking or totally mindblowing. Although there are lots of moments of brilliance by which I was completely fascinated, I was never completely taken by her emotionally. That seems like a big problem, but Meryl made up for it with the overall fantastic achievement plus it's more of the movie's and the screenplay's fault as they didn't give her any scenes to be emotionally captivating. Viola Davis' part was easier that way: although she had less screentime, she constantly had the opportunity to leave a huge impact. Meryl didn't have the chance for that, despite the fact how showy this part seems (it's much less showy than I imagined). But I guess Thatcher is a very reserved person and it was right not to make her too emotional.

Overall, Meryl Streep gives a fantastic performance as Margaret Thatcher. Although it's high time she won an Oscar and this is terrific work, this one is bit far from being as great as some of her other works like Sophie's Choice or The Deer Hunter (but honestly, how could she get better than that?). Still, she's just brilliant in the technical part of her performance, nails the emotional scenes and she's just thoroughly impressive playing this very controversial and divisive character. Again, not one of her best, but fantastic anyhow and 100% worthy of an Oscar win.

What do you think?