Other than the performance of Meryl Streep as former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, the “Iron Lady” of the title, and a superb makeup job in getting Streep to look gentrified, this apologetic look at Thatcher’s rise to power in Britain is not much of a movie. It does boast a nice supporting turn by Jim Broadbent as Denis Thatcher, who pops in and out of the story, particularly years after he has died.

Phyllida Lloyd’s movie is not a typical “rise to power” history or biography.  Lloyd’s concern is to present Thatcher in her elderly years, long after she has lost all the power she once wielded, as a lonely old woman who still resists letting go of the past. This is personified by her refusal to dispose of Denis’ clothing and effects some eight years after his passing, and it is not until she has done so that she finally finds some peace in her consciousness. This may have actually occurred, and it is symbolic of how difficult it is to age with dignity, but it doesn’t effectively fill a movie.

Thatcher’s politics and political history breeze through the story at opportune moments, with much emphasis being placed on the Falklands War. Not being a student of British history, this was unexciting to me, made worse by the fact that Lloyd’s movie doesn’t really care about Thatcher’s conservatism or beliefs, only that she stood by them, come hell or high water. Thatcher’s characteristics are nicely detailed, and her place in history is artfully positioned, yet she seems so alone, cut off from the public and even her own children, that her life seems empty, if not meaningless, in her advanced years. Again, this movie depicts how awful aging must be to someone once important and vital, but that’s not the story I expected to see. Nor is it particularly effective; apart from the superb acting of Streep and Broadbent the film has little to say and takes far too much time to say it.

Doubtless there are very good movies to be made of Britain’s tumultuous ride through the last half of the twentieth century, and of Margaret Thatcher’s unique place on that carousel of history. But this is not one of them.  ✰ ✰.  26 Jan. 2012.