Is it a leftie assassination job? Or right-wing hagiography? Neither. This is a personal, essentially feminist story, about how a shopkeeper's daughter conquered a very patrician world, how she was torn between ambition and family (ambition usually won), how hard it was to become the first woman ruler of Britain since Queen Anne.
While Meryl's physical impression of the British PM in her blue-bloused prime is bang on the money, it is the way in which she captures Thatcher's unshakeable inner certainty that really pays off in the film's favour. Olivia Colman plays daughter Carol Thatcher, and Jim Broadbent stars as husband Denis Thatcher.