The unsatisfying “Iron Lady”

By Tom Quiner

Margaret Thatcher had guts.

God, we will miss her. She stood for something that made the West great. She stood up for common sense, for free markets, and for liberty.

Phyllida Lord directed a 2011 film of Ms. Thatcher called “The Iron Lady,” which starred Meryl Streep.

Streep was magnificent and won a well-deserved Oscar for best actress. But the film just didn’t work. Here’s the way IMBD summarized the film:

Meryl Streep was magnificent as Margaret Thatcher in an otherwise weak film

“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.”

The film focused on the doddering Thatcher instead of the dynamic Thatcher. The drama of the Falkland Islands was reduced to a mere five minute snippet in the film.

Don’t waste your time on it.

Margaret Thatcher was a larger-than-life figure. This film set out to knock her down a peg.

The West is now dominated by leaders lacking in common sense; who loathe free markets; and disdain individual liberty if it has anything to do with religious conviction.

Not a one of them can fill her shoes.