The Iron Lady is not, as some critics have argued, apolitical. Nor does the director, Phyllida Lloyd, go out of her way to directly denounce Margaret Thatcher’s brutal neoliberal economic policies, obscene nationalism, and warmongering. The politics of this film are revealed instead by Meryl Streep’s astounding performance. In one scene near the middle of the film, we watch Thatcher practicing to become Thatcher: She learns to speak with authority, she changes her hair and clothes, she hardens her iron will. What Streep shows is that performance was the essence, the core, the ultimate source of Thatcher’s political power. (See Movie Times)