Reason Magazine: John Blundell- ‘Margaret Thatcher, Meryl Streep and The Iron Lady: Fact vs. Fiction’

Source:Reason Magazine– United Kingdom Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (Conservative, England)

Source:The Daily Post

“When I first heard of this movie,” says John Blundell, “I immediately was a little worried because of Meryl Streep’s own ideas and polices and so on that are very distinctly not Thatcherite.”

As a longtime Margaret Thatcher ally, few people are in a better position than John Blundell to assess the veracity of the Oscar-nominated bio-pic, The Iron Lady. The former head of influential free-market organizations such as The Institute of Economic Affairs, The Institute for Humane Studies, and the Atlas Economic Research Foundation, Blundell is also the author of Margaret Thatcher: A Portrait of the Iron Lady (2007) and the new Ladies for Liberty: Women Who Made a Difference in American History.

On the eve of the 2012 Academy Awards ceremony, Blundell sat down with Reason.tv to discuss the controversy surrounding the film (which depicts its titular character in the throes of demenita), Streep’s widely praised performance, and the continuing power of Thatcher’s social and political legacy.

“I must admit,” he says, “to being pleasantly surprised. I think overall Margaret comes out of this process with her reputation enhanced and, of course, Meryl Streep’s reputation hugely enhanced.”

From Reason Magazine

I saw the Iron Lady, the Meryl Streep bio movie about former United Kingdom Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher back in May. And I was expecting a great movie about one of the most important world leaders, in at least the last thirty years. And I was disappointed, I don’t believe this movie was intended for political junkies. Or even people who love history such as myself, whether its American history or world history. This movie was intended for people who love movies and feel the need to be entertained.

I think this movie is for people who are not interested in learning about important historical events and people and don’t find that interesting enough to watch that type of thing or read about it. So they see a movie and hopefully its more dressed up for them and comes off as more and I hate this term to describe things like this, but as sexy.

One credit I would give the Iron Lady and something that I was pleasantly surprised by, was that this movie didn’t try to make Maggie Thatcher look like some type of Conservative fool who was interested in selling out the interests of the country to private business interests and didn’t care about the needy and was always looking to go to war. I think Meryl Streep did a very good job of playing Maggie Thatcher as the person she was. And not some Hollywood Leftist vision of her.

To me, what stands out about Maggie Thatcher, who had about a twenty year career in the British Government in the UK Parliament, as Leader of the Opposition and then of course as Prime Minister, is all the important things in her career that they didn’t cover. They didn’t cover much of her as Leader of the Opposition and how she rose from that to be Prime Minister or. Her interactions with the UK Prime Minister. I believe they showed one Question Time performance, or her relationship with President Reagan, or, how she dealt with the Soviet Union.

The Iron Lady covered a little bit of the Falkan Islands conflict with Argentina in 1982 and her attempts to cut the British debt and deficit. But about an hour of this movie was about her life post-Prime Ministership. Even though it’s as Prime Minister where she really made her impact, not only in Britain, but the world as well.

I thought that Meryl Streep did a very good job of playing Maggie Thatcher with the material that was given her. As far as what aspects of her life they covered. But no offense to Prime Minister Thatcher, this movie as far as appearances has a similar issue as the movie Game Change had with Sarah Palin. Except that I believe that Meryl Streep is too attractive, too cute, and beautiful to play Maggie Thatcher. Whereas in Game Change, Julianne Moore is not attractive enough to play Sarah Palin, at least as far as I’m concern.