Margaret Thatcher, the Movie: I Still Reserve Judgment
Pam Meister has read the script and joins the ranks of those appalled by it. I haven't read it. (I'd be delighted to read it, Cameron McCracken of Pathe Films, if you'd like to send it to me. I assume I need not send you an e-mail to this effect. Don't be embarrassed; we all search under our own names.)
From her review of the script, though, it doesn't quite sound to me like a hit job. I may be wrong. But I again feel that this in fact sounds like an interesting way to explore her life, and possibly a sympathetic one. The fact that the movie treats her dementia, which is not a slander but a tragic reality, is not to me inherently a strike against it--unless you believe dementia to be a shameful condition. Nor is it insulting to suggest that she has been lonely in her old age, and that she misses her husband terribly. We know this is true. I noted this in my book. I tried in my own way to portray the terrible melancholy of this, and what it says about the limits of power and the price of it.
Whether this is a "hit job," I think, depends quite a bit on the actors, the way these lines are interpreted, their relative emphasis. And that I can't quite tell from the review.
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Oct '10
Re: Margaret Thatcher, the Movie: I Still Reserve Judgment
andrew breitbart and john nolte of bighollywood already have the thatcher movie script. hope somebody hook you up with them so you can do your own fisking.
May '10
Re: Margaret Thatcher, the Movie: I Still Reserve Judgment
I would be pleasantly astonished if it was not a hit job based on Hollywood's record.
Jul '10
Re: Margaret Thatcher, the Movie: I Still Reserve Judgment
One indication might be if they cast James Brolin in the lead part.
Jun '10
Re: Margaret Thatcher, the Movie: I Still Reserve Judgment
Oh come on, seriously, do you think these lefties care.
Jul '10
Re: Margaret Thatcher, the Movie: I Still Reserve Judgment
I despair of a movie about Thatcher that roots itself in her old age and "dotage" of ever being true to her magnificent accomplishments. Ms. Meister is quite right to disparage the questions with which the script concerns itself. Conservative women are shown to choose career over family in a negative way; liberal women making the same decision are seen positively.
I thoroughly enjoyed your book. The depiction of a dysfunctional Britain meeting the irresistible Thatcher is very well done. I do not think the movie will share your vision.