I admit
to having this love hate thing with Meryl Streep over the years. I never paid much attention to her career even
though the NYT film critics were constantly reporting her latest triumph over
the years. I have no sexual attraction, fantasy/sexual tension (?), towards the actress or the personalities she has portrayed over
the years.
It
took me literally thirty years to see Deer Hunter which was her first stellar
part. I think I formed a wrong opinion
of her perhaps after seeing Kramer vs. Kramer in a theater with a
girlfriend. I perhaps equated her
performance with the real life relationship that was shaky and ended after that
movie quite literally.
I
perhaps also had mistaken Ms. Streep for one of these chameleon actors like Keanu
Reeves whose film performances seems to only reflect those he acts with rather
than the performance itself. I perhaps
mistook Meryl’s performance as a chameleon thing along side Dustin Hoffman’s
performance in Kramer vs. Kramer.
In every movie he does, Dustin Hoffman plays
Dustin Hoffman to this day. There is
that annoying point in every Hoffman performance where he does that nasal thing
in his voice, a metaphor for his maximum method “acting” effort thing and the
rest of the performance returns to simply low point Dustin fare (mumbling). (There can only be one Brando Dustin.)
I
did not see Sophie’s Choice when it came out.
It seemed a chick flick and there is a saturation point in any life
regarding seeing another Holocaust related story.
My
real and eternal admiration came in the movie Silkwood. Saw it with some friends, had not heard of
the movie ten minutes before I went in to see it. Then on the way out, I saw a movie poster and
saw that the admirable performance of the actress in that movie had been Meryl
Streep. My jaw dropped. I saw a movie, liked the performance, and did
not know who the actress was; perhaps I was a bit tipsy. I then and there conceded that Meryl Streep
was a very good actress but remained no great fan.
In
her later years, I have seen wonderful performances of Streep in movies on TV
and not in the movie houses. I will not go on about which flicks I liked of
hers over the years or why.
I
did last night pay to see her performance on Cable TV in her latest Oscar
winning performance in the Iron Lady.
She deserved the Oscar for it as a seasoned character actress of the first
class kind in the old Hollywood definitions of such.
I
must say however that the script and the storyline of The Iron Lady is Shit.
I
was expecting a sympathetic performance of the cold calculating ambitious
British politician of Margaret Thatcher. I was sadly disappointed.
This
is the sort of movie you do after a famous person is dead to invoke
sympathy. No doubt the movie financed
with Brit cash is an attempt to make Margaret Thatcher palatable after all
these years among the population. Propaganda flick Meryl? And an attempt to quell the numbers, millions
of Brits, who will literally be dancing in the streets on the day of her actual death?
Good
performance. Bad script. Worthless subject matter.
I
will say in retrospective that perhaps Dementia in Lady Thatcher’s case or Alzheimer’s
in Ronald Reagan’s case is perhaps caused by people who never practiced
thinking in their lifetime. Never formed
an original thought in their lives. Not a nice thing to say.
Don’t
pay money to see this movie and you won’t need any Kleenex if you do. (Dry. Very dry. Two drops of vermouth worth.)
Deer Hunter http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077416/
Kramer vs. Kramer http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079417/
The Iron Lady http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1007029/
.
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