Iron Lady, Feeble Film

The current film “The Iron Lady” purports to give an account of the life and career of Margaret Thatcher, former prime minister of the United Kingdom. In this the film fails. It does provide a superb vehicle for Meryl Streep to display her well-known acting talent.

But instead of an overview of Lady Thatcher’s career and accomplishments, it portrays a version so slanted that one might suspect it was written and produced by leftists who were no admirers of Thatcher. Oh wait, it was. We are shocked − shocked! − to find leftists in the film industry.

The bulk of the film depicts Lady Thatcher as a senile old woman, bumbling around her rooms and talking to her dead husband Denis. If I were in charge, I would have used her later years as a brief introduction and a brief conclusion, with most of the film devoted to Thatcher’s political career. But of course, for Hollywood to put a conservative in charge of anything except cleaning the toilets is as likely as a pig learning to fly and breaking the New York-Paris speed record. Come to think of it, I’d bet on the pig.

Selected parts of Thatcher’s life are shown in brief flashbacks. We see her as a child, with her parents in an air-raid shelter during a bombing. Some members of the audience will be able to guess that this occurred during World War II.

Perhaps, if it had been made clear that Thatcher suffered through Nazi bombings as a child, the audience might better understand why she grew up to hate totalitarianism and aggression, and to know that they must be resisted with all available force. Then her fierce anti-Communism might make more sense, and her insistence that the Falkland Islands be retaken after the Argentine invasion might be more comprehensible.

But instead, her anti-Communism is not explained, her role −with Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II − in its defeat is underplayed, and her insistence on retaking the Falklands is shown as dangerous pig-headedness. In short, we have a historical film that is seriously lacking in history. Score another point for Hollywood.

The film shows a young Thatcher studying with a speech coach. She had to get rid of her working-class accent in order to rise in politics. Brits are like that. But Bill Clinton and George W. Bush had no need to get rid of their accents in order to be elected president. Americans are like that.

On the other hand, Barack Obama feels the need to put on an accent when speaking to a black audience. Of course, Thatcher felt no need to put on a working-class accent when speaking to a working-class audience. She would have found the idea laughable.

The film mentions that Thatcher graduated from Oxford. It omits that she did so on a scholarship and with honors, that her degree was in chemistry, and that for a time she worked in chemical research. The film also omits that later, she studied law and qualified as a barrister − not bad for a grocer’s daughter whose family lived above the store. On the plus side, the film shows how Thatcher overcame prejudice against women and against her working-class origins.

But to leftists, humble origins are noble only if the result is more leftists. If humble origins produce conservatives, they are seen as traitors to their class − as witness Rick Santorum, Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Sarah Palin, Dr. Thomas Sowell, Dr. Walter Williams, and many others. Leftists are obsessed with class, as well as gender and race − but they project their feelings onto conservatives, whom they accuse of being bigots. Psychology explains a good deal of politics.

Much is made of Thatcher’s struggle to break the stranglehold of the trade unions on the British economy, but mainly from the point of view of the workers who were angry at having their benefits reduced. The film was completed before the recent British riots, so the attempt to make the audience sympathize with the demonstrators tends to fall flat. Only a few months ago, we saw how pointlessly destructive such riots can be.

And of course, we never hear Thatcher’s statement that so beautifully sums up our current economic problems:

Socialist governments traditionally do make a financial mess. They always run out of other people’s money. It’s quite characteristic of them. Then they start to nationalise everything, and people just do not like more and more nationalisation, and they’re now trying to control everything by other means. They’re progressively reducing the choice available to ordinary people.

Thatcher is shown as ambitious and tough, which she surely was. But many of the results of that ambition and toughness are slighted or ignored entirely. She finally becomes prime minister − but not shown is her trip to the palace to be formally appointed by Queen Elizabeth, who oddly never appears in the film. After her retirement, she is called Lady Thatcher, but her trip to the palace to be ennobled by the Queen is also omitted. This is like making a film about an Olympic champion, but omitting the medal ceremony − a rather large omission, wouldn’t you say?

Apparently the film makers dislike a conservative leader so much that they omit key scenes, even though these scenes would have made the film more visually engaging. Besides the scenes with Queen Elizabeth, the film also omits Thatcher’s close friendship and cooperation with President Reagan in hastening the fall of the Soviet Union − a rather large omission, wouldn’t you say?

The film also omits any mention of Britain’s participation in the first Gulf War, with Thatcher’s famous admonition to George Bush the Elder: “Don’t go all wobbly on me now, George.” Was the Gulf War unimportant, or merely unimportant to the film makers? Was reversing Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait a striking example of Thatcher’s hatred of aggression? Not to the film makers.

So instead of an objective treatment of Thatcher’s successful effort to de-socialize at least a portion of the British economy, and instead of almost any treatment of Thatcher’s key role in the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, and instead of any treatment at all of the Gulf War, we watch endless scenes of a senile old woman shuffling around her rooms in a haze.

But in fact, it is the film makers themselves who operate in a haze − a haze due not to advanced age, which is sad, but to advanced leftism, which is inexcusable.

This isn’t the first biopic about a conservative in which the accomplishments were minimized but the problems were maximized. Recall “J. Edgar,” where Hoover’s effective fight against Nazi spies and saboteurs during World War II was omitted entirely, while much time was spent on his alleged homosexuality. Now there’s objective history for you.

The problem is that left-slanted history is what many young people learn in school.

Nor is this the first time that liberals have shown lack of concern for a conservative suffering from dementia. Recall how Michael Moore did an ambush interview of Charlton Heston outside Heston’s home. And recall George Clooney’s “joke” that Heston announced he had Alzheimer’s − again. When challenged, Clooney claimed Heston deserved whatever anyone said about him because he was active in the National Rifle Association. And don’t forget the demonization of Rick Santorum for his way of dealing with the death of his newborn baby, or the disgusting things said about Ronald Reagan when he died of Alzheimer’s. Now there’s liberal compassion for you.

The problem is that this is the model of compassion that many liberals will emulate.

The 86-year-old Margaret Thatcher has had strokes and reportedly now suffers from dementia. This is tragic, but it in no way detracts from her accomplishments. Or do the film makers have the primitive belief that illness is a punishment for wrongdoing? Could this be what the film is intended to imply?

Yes, the Iron Lady finally rusted, but only after accomplishing more than the vast majority of so-called world leaders. But true to its leftist bias, Hollywood concentrates on the rust and minimizes the iron. That tells us more about Hollywood than it does about the Iron Lady herself.

Still, in order to become demented, first you have to be mented − which is more than many current politicians can claim. It wasn’t brilliant planning and deep thought that got us into this awful mess.

Dr. Stolinsky writes on political and social issues. Contact: dstol@prodigy.net. You are welcome to publish or post these articles, provided that you cite the author and website.

I have to say, I don’t agree with a lot of this. I thought it was a pretty decent film and quite a fair treatment of Lady Thatcher’s life, especially considering the biases that are involved.

I do think they made a little too much of the scenes with Sir Denis Thatcher but I think some of those scenes were important to show how important he was to her, and how much his loss has devastated her.

On a few of your comments - I think it should be utterly obvious to anyone with any knowledge of history that the scenes in the air raid shelter occurred during the Second World War and the Nazi bombing of Great Britain. I don’t think that needed to be said at all. Especially as the film was primarily intended for a British audience.

That is also the reason why the film does not focus on her anti-Communism, because in Britain, that isn’t the important part of her legacy. Her legacy in Britain is rebuilding the country after the malaise of the 1970s and leading Britain through the Falklands War. Yes, on a world scale, defeating communism was critical but it’s not the important part of her legacy in Britain.

Lady Thatcher was also not of working class origins. She was of middle class origins and fiercely proud of that and I do think the film makes that very clear. Her father was a successful businessman, not wealthy but quite comfortable, and a city alderman, and Mayor of the city of Grantham for a time as well.

There are good reasons as well why scenes involving Lady Thatcher appearing at Buckingham Palace to receive her honours are not shown - because this hasn’t actually happened with most of the honours she’s received. She became Lady Thatcher for the first time when her husband was Knighted and she gained the courtesy title of Lady. When she was elevated to the peerage as Baroness of Kesteven, there was no ceremony involved as there isn’t with such awards. Her investiture as a Lady Companion of the Garter could have been shown, I suppose, but by tradition, such investitures are private affairs and most people would have no idea what they were seeing if it had been shown, because they are not shown. These are not the public ceremonies shown on the news sometimes - Lady Thatcher has never been given one of the Honours handed out in that way.

(1) I fear you are an optimist. Many people today have little idea of what happened during World War II, and Thatcher’s childhood experience of being bombed undoubtedly shaped her attitude toward totalitarian aggressors.

I don't believe I am being at all optimistic. I've lived in Britain - I have joint Australian and British citizenship - and knowledge of World War II is extremely prevalent, except perhaps among the youngest generation. Far more prevalent than it is in the United States. This is because everybody in Britain has parents or grandparents who lived through the war at home - it wasn't something that occurred on the other side of the world which only soldiers and other servicepeople experienced for themselves.

(2) My limited knowledge of investiture of life peers comes from here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders,_decorations,_and_medals_of_the_United_Kingdom#Ceremony

My knowledge of this isn't limited. I am a Member of the Order of Australia, which is a British order of chivalry, and I spent some time as a protocol officer assigned to the Australian High Commission in London during the 1990s. I've been through an investiture myself, and I've been present at a number of others. The ceremonies described on the page you are talking about are what are referred to as a 'public investiture'. They are used for the presentation of a great number of honours, but not all honours are presented in this way. In particular, the honours that Lady Thatcher has received are always handed out at private investiture ceremonies. Lady Thatcher is a Member of the Order of Merit, and a Lady Companion of the Garter. Both of these very high honours are in the personal gift of the Monarch personally, rather than being bestowed by the Monarch on the advice of her government and neither are given out at public investitures. The Order of Merit does not actually involve any ceremony rather the Queen simply appoints the person through an announcement in the London Gazette, and investitures for the Garter occur in private in the presence of other members of the Order, not the public.

Life Peers are not invested at any ceremony. Their peerage is given by the Queen in the form of Letters Patent, and published in the London Gazette. There is no ceremony involved. There is a ceremony when they first join the House of Lords as a Peer but showing that would not really serve any purpose and it should also be understood that for somebody like Lady Thatcher, a former Prime Minister, joining the Lords is, while an honour, also a sign that your real career is over - Members of the House of Commons refer to being made a Peer as being 'kicked upstairs' with an implication they are being got out of the way.

(3) Denis Thatcher was created a baronet, not a knight, and this was not shown either, nor was Maggie’s investiture in the Order of Merit

A Baronet is a Knight. It is a form of hereditary knighthood - very rarely given nowadays, Sir Denis was the only new Baronet since 1965. The ceremony of investiture used to be the same as for a Knight Bachelor. I had assumed Sir Denis did go through this ceremony, but I can't actually find any reference to him doing so and it's strictly speaking not necessary - a Baronet can simply be gazetted. At this point after checking the Gazette, I don't think Sir Denis went through an investiture for his Baronetcy which means the only time he would have gone through an investiture was in 1945 before he'd married, when he was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire at the end of World War II.

(4) As prime minister, Thatcher met with the Queen regularly, and surely did to receive her appointment and to resign it.

Yes, but these are private ceremonies. Deliberately so. And details of them are not made public. They leak sometimes, of course, especially with certain Prime Ministers, but Lady Thatcher didn't play those types of games and so showing these private meetings would involve making things up and not presenting things accurately. Following 'The Queen' (the 2006 film alleged to show the aftermath of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, from the perspective of the Queen and Prime Minister Tony Blair) there was considerable criticism of the film makers precisely because they made up such scenes which was not considered appropriate in a film that professes to be historically accurately. Tony Blair was also criticised on the grounds that some people believe he must have leaked details of these private meetings. The makers of 'The Iron Lady' have avoided those mistakes and I think quite correctly.

(5) A film about the head of government of the UK, and not once hearing “God Save the Queen” or any other traditional music?

The use of 'God Save the Queen' in a film is something that should be done very carefully. It's not just music. It is the Royal and National Anthem. Use of 'God Save the Queen' in a film about Lady Thatcher would actually be rather inappropriate as it might imply that she was somehow occupying such a role - something she would never imply.

I would have liked to have heard some traditional British music, myself, but certainly not 'God Save the Queen' used inappropriately.

(6) Outside the military, people today—especially Hollywood—have little sense of tradition, or of the ceremonies and music that goes with it. How sad.

I do understand such things and I don't think 'The Iron Lady' handled things badly. Showing private meetings involving the Queen where nobody knows what happened, or made up ceremonies which didn't happen would have been a mistake.

There was one mistake of protocol in the film that did annoy me. In the scene near the end where Lady Thatcher is sitting alone on the front benches of the House of Commons, the Mace can be seen on the table in front of her. The Mace should not have been there. It only sits in that position when the House of Commons is in session. This is a mistake that shouldn't have been made by somebody doing their research properly.

(1) Saying a baronet is a hereditary knight is like saying a duke is a baron, only more so.

This is something regularly debated by the experts. I subscribe to the relatively common view that a Baronetcy of first creation (which is what Sir Denis received as he is the First Baronet) is a Knighthood under Warrants of James I issued in 1612. A Baronetcy that has been inherited (such as that now held by Sir Mark Thatcher as 2nd Baronet) is not a knighthood, but at first creation, a Baronet is a Knight. His Knighthood is that of a Knight Bachelor.

This precedent was important when the House of Lords was reformed in the late 1990s as it was the reason why all the Hereditary Peers of First Creation were allowed to continue in the House of Lords as Life Peers.

(2) I said nothing about PUBLIC ceremonies. Showing Thatcher meeting the queen would have been dramatic.

Yes, and it also would have involved making up details of meetings because the details of such meetings are kept private. 'The Queen' was rightly criticised for its attempts to rewrite history by showing meetings between Tony Blair and the Queen, presenting a very particular version of history favourable to Mr Blair, knowing that Her Majesty would never comment to correct the record even if it was accurate.

A couple of years ago, there was a BBC television drama called 'Margaret' which did show an alleged meeting between the Queen and Baroness Thatcher right at the end of her Premiership. This drama presented the Queen as advising (then) Mrs Thatcher to resign (based on the Queen having accurate numbers about how people were going to vote and knowing Mrs Thatcher would not win). We do not know if that was accurate or not - some think it is, some think it is not. Regardless, the scene created controversy because it refers to matters that should remain private. Meetings between the Queen and her Prime Ministers are confidential for a reason - because if they were not, neither could be constitutionally free to disagree about some issues without risking a constitutional crisis. I think the makers of 'The Iron Lady' were right to avoid this type of controversy with their film, after the issues created in recent years by other dramatisations.

(3) I’m glad to hear that Brits know more about World War II than we Yanks. But judging by the yammerings of the people at the recent riots, I’m not so sure.

Those morons are not representative of the average Briton. All nations have their share of the ignorant and ill educated.

(4) Hearing “God Save the Queen,” “British Grenadiers,” “A Life on the Ocean Wave,” or any other military march would have lent authenticity. Or what about the pipes playing “The Crags of Tumbledown” when the troops came home? You know, just a bit of heart? Just listen—http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTzcL2SfYgw

As I've said, I wouldn't have minded more traditional music, but I'm not a film maker. And 'Soldiers of the Queen' is part of the film's soundtrack although personally I can't remember hearing it.

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