HUH?? Good lord, if you actually think Devil Wears Prada is Meryl's best performance, you've clearly never seen Silkwood, Sophie's Choice, A Cry in the Dark, Kramer vs Kramer, Ironweed, The French Liuetenant's Woman, Out of Africa.....

 

I have and they are great performances. I just think this and Devil are better, but that's perhaps down to the nature of the films as much as anything. Whilst her performance in all those you noted IS great, I didn't enjoy the films.

 

I have and they are great performances. I just think this and Devil are better, but that's perhaps down to the nature of the films as much as anything. Whilst her performance in all those you noted IS great, I didn't enjoy the films.

 

Definition of Meryl Streep right there.

'The Hours' was probably the last film of hers I actually liked and even then she was far from the highlight (hello Julianne Moore, how you don't have an Oscar already CONFUSES me greatly). 'Doubt' was alright, patchy when you look beyond the incredible cast though. 'The Devil Wears Prada' wasn't for me, neither was 'Julie & Julia'. She's an undoubtable talent but I'd love to see her work with someone like Darren Aronofsky, Paul Thomas Anderson, Terrence Malick, Lars von Trier, Coen brothers etc.

 

THIS!!

Really enjoyed this film. Wow Maggie Thatcher was AMAZING wasn't she. :wub:

:D

Really enjoyed this film. Wow Maggie Thatcher was AMAZING wasn't she. :wub:

Such a troll!

I have and they are great performances. I just think this and Devil are better, but that's perhaps down to the nature of the films as much as anything. Whilst her performance in all those you noted IS great, I didn't enjoy the films.

 

You're not really meant to "enjoy" a film like Silkwood, A Cry In the Dark, Ironweed or Sophie's Choice though, they're not "entertainment", they're supposed to make you think about what you're seeing presented on the screen and challenge your perceptions. They are great films, IMO, and deserve their status..... Devil Wears Prada is enjoyable enough, but it's mere fluff....

 

Really enjoyed this film. Wow Maggie Thatcher was AMAZING wasn't she. :wub:

 

I wasn't aware she was dead....

 

You're not really meant to "enjoy" a film like Silkwood, A Cry In the Dark, Ironweed or Sophie's Choice though, they're not "entertainment", they're supposed to make you think about what you're seeing presented on the screen and challenge your perceptions. They are great films, IMO, and deserve their status..... Devil Wears Prada is enjoyable enough, but it's mere fluff....

 

Well, perhaps if I had wanted my perceptions challenged I would have been suitably fulfilled by them. I, however, watch films for enjoyment so was not.

Are you seriously going to try and downplay her achievement in getting elected as Prime Minister now?

 

 

 

...and jark - are you seriously trying to applaud this woman? Because with all due respect, if you think her rise to power/dictatorship was some glorious struggle against the odds, was some one-woman challenge in a man's world, as this flimsy movie would have you believe... well, sorry, but that's just not the case. She became Tory PM because the Tory party was so hopelessly inept, clueless and out of touch at that time.,.... there simply WAS no other leader - gender regardless.

 

And if you're thinking of basking in some obscene rose-tinted memoir that Thatcher was a 'great leader' - well.... so was Adolf Hitler. It might do you well to investigate some of this 'lady's' policies. Especially Section 28. She was singularly the most dangerous, divisive, fascistic PM this country has experienced in living memory. And I lived through it - which is very different to hearing second hand accounts from relatives or books.

 

And Meryl Streep should know better than to taint a pretty impressive film career with starring in this one-dimensional, inaccurate portrayal of this monstrous woman. It's far from ok that she distances herself from Thatcher's politics now - she knew the score when she read the script, she could see how it glossed over her war crimes and misdeeds. It's too late to have an opinion now, Ms Streep......

 

At best, this is 'made-for-TV' fluff. And her portrayal of Thatcher? Humdrum, hammy and embarrassing in parts. You'd just never think this was a distinguished and lauded actress with decades of incredible roles (and...err..Mamma Mia) behind her. She comes across as some awful b-movie actress who simply doesn't 'get' her subject, she overplays her hand at every turn. She's quite shockingly terrible in Iron Lady.

 

But, as it's a Brit 'period' historical movie..... it'll win award after award unfortunately.

 

Three triangles... I agree - how on earth has Julianne Moore not got an Oscar? Her absolute career highlight for me, in a career full of highlights, has to be her stunning performance in A Single Man...... then again, Mr Firth should have walked away with the Oscar for this masterpiece, too.

Well, perhaps if I had wanted my perceptions challenged I would have been suitably fulfilled by them. I, however, watch films for enjoyment so was not.

 

So, err, why bother watching them in the first place if that's your rather narrow approach to film. Surely you must've been aware of the subjects of the films and should have realised that they weren't exactly gonna be your thing.... Just to take Sophies Choice as an example I dont exactly know of very many "light-hearted comedies" centred around the Jewish Holocaust...

 

I suppose next you'll be saying you weren't sufficiently "entertained" by Schindler's List or The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas....

 

Personally, i watch many different genres and types of films for different reasons, sometimes i want to be entertained, sometimes I want to be challenged, sometimes i want to be scared or thrilled, sometimes i want to be head-fukked....

...and jark - are you seriously trying to applaud this woman? Because with all due respect, if you think her rise to power/dictatorship was some glorious struggle against the odds, was some one-woman challenge in a man's world, as this flimsy movie would have you believe... well, sorry, but that's just not the case. She became Tory PM because the Tory party was so hopelessly inept, clueless and out of touch at that time.,.... there simply WAS no other leader - gender regardless.

 

And if you're thinking of basking in some obscene rose-tinted memoir that Thatcher was a 'great leader' - well.... so was Adolf Hitler. It might do you well to investigate some of this 'lady's' policies. Especially Section 28. She was singularly the most dangerous, divisive, fascistic PM this country has experienced in living memory. And I lived through it - which is very different to hearing second hand accounts from relatives or books.

 

And Meryl Streep should know better than to taint a pretty impressive film career with starring in this one-dimensional, inaccurate portrayal of this monstrous woman. It's far from ok that she distances herself from Thatcher's politics now - she knew the score when she read the script, she could see how it glossed over her war crimes and misdeeds. It's too late to have an opinion now, Ms Streep......

 

At best, this is 'made-for-TV' fluff. And her portrayal of Thatcher? Humdrum, hammy and embarrassing in parts. You'd just never think this was a distinguished and lauded actress with decades of incredible roles (and...err..Mamma Mia) behind her. She comes across as some awful b-movie actress who simply doesn't 'get' her subject, she overplays her hand at every turn. She's quite shockingly terrible in Iron Lady.

 

But, as it's a Brit 'period' historical movie..... it'll win award after award unfortunately.

 

Three triangles... I agree - how on earth has Julianne Moore not got an Oscar? Her absolute career highlight for me, in a career full of highlights, has to be her stunning performance in A Single Man...... then again, Mr Firth should have walked away with the Oscar for this masterpiece, too.

 

Well said. Jark is too young to know any better, so he just believes whatever rubbish fantasy some Hollywood producer wants to spin about a figure in history he's completely detached from, because he never had to deal with the reality of living in Scotland, Wales or the North during this period...

 

So, err, why bother watching them in the first place if that's your rather narrow approach to film. Surely you must've been aware of the subjects of the films and should have realised that they weren't exactly gonna be your thing.... Just to take Sophies Choice as an example I dont exactly know of very many "light-hearted comedies" centred around the Jewish Holocaust...

 

I suppose next you'll be saying you weren't sufficiently "entertained" by Schindler's List or The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas....

 

Personally, i watch many different genres and types of films for different reasons, sometimes i want to be entertained, sometimes I want to be challenged, sometimes i want to be scared or thrilled, sometimes i want to be head-fukked....

 

I'd hardly call watching films for 'enjoyment' a 'narrow approach', simply a different one. The words 'did not enjoy' do not equal 'hated' or 'disliked', of course I didn't ENJOY Sophie's Choice, I was moved by it, however it's not something I would choose to watch again. I didn't watch it so my mind could be opened to new truths either though, I watched it because it seemed like a good film.

Well said. Jark is too young to know any better, so he just believes whatever rubbish fantasy some Hollywood producer wants to spin about a figure in history he's completely detached from, because he never had to deal with the reality of living in Scotland, Wales or the North during this period...

 

Or maybe he does know more about it than you give him credit for and he has come to his own conclusion, hard as that might be for you to accept?

LOL. Grimly's just looking to get a rise out of anybody who doesn't want to be force-fed his factoids.

 

For my money most of the responses provoked by film - the ability to make you think or move you - are all a form of entertainment anyway. Entertainment is a very broad term. You wouldn't give two hours of your time and pay money if you weren't going to be entertained. Entertainment and intellect don't have to be mutually exclusive. So I think it's perfectly fair for John to watch films for entertainment. It's their primary purpose. This is the last post I'll be making in response to Grimly though. He was never going to manage any fair objectivity in this topic even by his ridiculous standards.

 

LOL. Grimly's just looking to get a rise out of anybody who doesn't want to be force-fed his factoids.

 

For my money most of the responses provoked by film - the ability to make you think or move you - are all a form of entertainment anyway. Entertainment is a very broad term. You wouldn't give two hours of your time and pay money if you weren't going to be entertained. Entertainment and intellect don't have to be mutually exclusive. So I think it's perfectly fair for John to watch films for entertainment. It's their primary purpose. This is the last post I'll be making in response to Grimly though. He was never going to manage any fair objectivity in this topic even by his ridiculous standards.

 

 

Jark, you giving anyone a lecture in objectivity is frankly hilarious...

 

I dont mind someone making a film about Thatcher, but the treatment of the subject in this film is complete garbage and attempts to re-write history in a manner that is both trite and insulting to the intelligence. Compared to Downfall, which is a film made about probably one of the most evil people in history, Adolf Hitler, that film is powerful, moving, disturbing, and manages to actually humanise these people without ever being trite or ever dumbing-down, without trying to make you forget who and what these people actually were and not trying to create some false mythology that they were somehow "underdogs struggling against system".... Hitler was a bast*rd, I wont ever change my opinion on that, but for two and a half hours of Downfall, I can see and appreciate the more human side of him without ever forgetting he was a bast*rd; in fact, presenting the human side of the Nazis gives it an even more chilling dimension.. The Iron Lady tries to make the viewer believe some bullshit fairy tale about Thatcher being some kind of Feminist Icon... In short, Downfall, is the work of real film-makers who know their subject and I give them credit for presenting a figure in history whom I detest utterly in an intelligent and thought-provoking manner; The Iron Lady is the product of people who are film illiterates who dumbed down Thatcherism into the film equivalent of a fun-sized Mars bar, and at worst are just downright dishonest and are creating a false myth.... If The Iron Lady had been even half the film Downfall was, then I would have no issues with it...

Finally got around to seeing this tonight. I went in with a full knowledge of what it was going to be like (not really a biopic, more of a tale of dimentia which happens to feature her) and came out fully satisfied. Meryl's performance was sensational, as expected, and actually the supporting cast did a great job all round too. There were a few issues, the removal of a few of my favourite lines from the trailera (namely: THAT'S the tone we want to STRIKE *smirk), but that's minor and only irked me because I wanted to see it on the big screen. Hopefully it'll be a deleted scene on the DVD.

 

Pretty much this. I definitely appreciate Meryl's performance in it more than the film itself though.

 

 

I well thought she was gonna fall down the stairs at the end.

 

Edited January 19, 201213 yr by JakeWild

I don't believe its real because its impossible :(

Saw this. Hated it.

 

I don't like Meryl Streep in overacting mode. Much like the cringeworthy Julia Childs performance.

can't bear to watch this no matter how good it is because i hate her