The Iron Lady
I love a good biopic movie but they have been not only quite scarce in 2012 but pretty rubbish.
We have already looked at the shortcomings of J.Edgar on our countdown of the Worse Movies of 2012 but now it is time to do the same to The Iron Lady as this movie is in at number five.
The Iron Lady was one of the most talked about movies of the early part of 2012 as Meryl Streep has been the favourite for the Best Actress Oscar long before the nominations were even announced.
And while Streep does deliver a terrific turn I am afraid that the rest of the movie lets down her great central performance.
The Iron Lady is an intimate portrait of Margaret Thatcher (Streep), the first and only female Prime Minister of The United Kingdom.
One of the 20th century's most famous and influential women, Thatcher came from nowhere to smash through barriers of gender and class to be heard in a male dominated world.
As I said Streep is simply brilliant as she has captured the voice and the posture of Thatcher and depicts has a strong and sometimes incredibly stubborn woman.
She single handedly carries and saves this movie and her performance is better than the film itself.
The film is just muddles as director Phyllida Lloyd moves the film at a snails pace and jumps back and forth between the present and the past.
The present show Thatcher as an old lady who is struggling with dementia and feel trapped in her own home. While the past shows her as a young woman trying to be accepted into politics before becoming the first woman prime minister.
Thatcher was a political figure that was loved and loathed equally and the disruption and pain that she brought to this country is really not shown - it would have been a very power part of the film; not to mention it is a huge part of her legacy.
You just felt that the script spent too much film faffing with jumping between different times in her life rather then truly telling the tale of Thatcher in power.
As if that is not bad enough it does turn incredibly melodramatic towards the end and there are certain scenes between Streep and Jim Broadbent that I could have done without.
The Iron Lady was a chance to make a very powerful political bio-pic and instead it is nothing movie than a movie fit for TV - all except Streep's performance of course which really is a tour-de-force.
But Streep and the rest of the talented cast are really let down by the script and that is a major shame.
Check out the countdown of the Worst Movies of 2012 so far:
7. J. Edgar
9. Prometheus
10. Taken 2
FemaleFirst Helen Earnshaw
Tagged in Meryl Streep