The Lady - L'amore per la libertà

With such a fascinating subject matter this movie would have been an interesting watch no matter who directed it but I think Luc Besson did a good job showing he is more than just an action thriller director. Of course there are some violent parts showing the brutality of the Military that are in your face and exciting as expected. He handled the private woman and her personal sacrifice and bravery in a tasteful manner.

Michelle Yeoh does a brilliant job. It's a really good fit for her. She is good in both the intimate moments dealing with her family and in her dignified public persona. She deserves an acting nomination for her work. David Thewlis is well cast as a disheveled looking professor type.

The subtitles are a major part of the movie with lots of dialog in Burmese. But it's still easy to follow the plot which doesn't jump around too much and is well laid out. It deserves a place among the better political true life movies. While not as dramatic or gut wrenching as "Cry Freedom" or "the Killing Fields", it still delivers a powerful message. Those interested can also watch "Beyond Rangoon" with Patricia Arquette which is a more adventure style portrayal of the events in Burma.

Wish the movie could have shown more recent events including her recent release. Reminds us there is still a long way to go in Burma.

Touching and a must watch.

This is one of the best films I have seen in a long time. It was highly entertaining, emotionally evoking and educational. I had known very little on the situation in Bhurma, and felt the summaries I read prior to visiting the cinema to see this film did not do justice to this cinematic gem. I came away from the screening determined to learn more and do what small part I could to right the wrongs portrayed in The Lady. The setting was wonderful, and I felt the cast played their parts marvellously. Many write ups of the film have criticised the length, however I do not think the story could have developed to give one a reasonable overview of the situation with a shorter script. It would be unnecessary to follow each of the characters' developments in the film, particularly given the length of time in question.

I would recommend this film to anyone as essential viewing, whether or not you have an interest in political affairs or not. The politics in The Lady is so simply set out and self- explanatory that anyone would understand the issues at hand.

I personally like biopics & this one was very helpful in giving me a glimpse of what's happening in Burma. Much has been said about the fight for liberty in this country as well as about the fierceness of Suu Kyi & watching this film made me more interested with how our counterparts in Burma are working towards their full liberation.

Suu Kyi's situation reminds me of our very own, Cory Aquino, who herself was an icon of democracy.

The movie gave me an insight of Suu Kyi's struggles & sacrifices just like Mrs. Aquino herself. One thing that the movie did is for viewers to appreciate the liberty we currently have & the closeness we will feel to Suu Kyi.

Great acting chops for Michelle Yeoh & David Thewlis. I wonder why they were not even nominated for an Oscar. Magnificent cinematography too.

A highly recommended film.

Making a commercial film about a struggle for human rights and democracy is a real struggle because most audiences want entertainment and not politics. So the producers have to find an 'angle'. In 1987, "A World Apart" told the story of the fight against apartheid in South Africa but through the prism of the strain that this put on ANC activist Ruth First's relationship with her young daughter. A similar approach is used here in this account of the life of Aung San Suu Kyi, the eponymous lady and leader of the National League for Democracy in the dictatorship that has ruled Burma for most of the period since post-war independence from Britain. So it is not politics as such which is to the fore here but Suu Kyi's relationship with her husband, Oxford academic Michael Aris, and most especially the regime's brutal refusal to allow Aris to see his wife one last time when he was dying of prostate cancer. It is a gut-wrenchingly sad tale.

Malaysian-born actress Michelle Yeoh - a Bond girl in "Tomorrow Never Dies" and pugilist star of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" - looks perfect in the leading role, giving a performance which, while often understated, is deeply moving. David Thewlis (various "Harry Potter" films and "The Boy With The Striped Pyjamas") is very effective as the long-suffering husband. The exotic locations and local faces in Thailand serve the movie well and original music by the French Eric Serra plus some Mozart enhance the emotional power of the work. It is perhaps no surprise that the script for what is in essence a love story comes from a female writer - the British Rebecca Frayn - but one might not expect the identity of the director for this Anglo-French film: Luc Besson, best known for such action movies as "Nikita", "Leon" and "The Fifth Element".

"The Lady" may be a bit one-dimensional and lack nuance, but it highlights a long struggle for human rights that is not sufficiently well-known and the timing of its release (I saw it in January 2012) is poignant. When filming started, Suu Kyi was still under house arrest, as she had been in total for some 15 years, but by the time the film was finished she had been released. At the end of the movie, the iron grip of the regime and the number of political prisoners are highlighted but, in the weeks around the film's release, the generals instituted a series of liberalisation measures including the freeing of most political prisoners. If all this augurs an era of genuine democracy in Burma, "The Lady" will be a wonderful testimony to the power of personal courage and sacrifice to effect political change.

Based on the story by Rebecca Frayn, who had spent three years interviewing close confidantes of Aung San Suu Kyi, the narrative provides the points of view of both Suu Kyi herself, played by Michelle Yeoh, and her husband Michael Aris (David Thewlis), who because of her political awakening and development, caused plenty of emotionally painful, physical separation and time spent apart through her standing up for and accepting her countrymen's push for democratic leadership, after years of military rule from generalissimos Ne Win to Tan Shwe (Agga Poechit). It also presents different perspectives both within and outside of Burma as crises began to unfold with Suu Kyi a prisoner of her own home and country, and Michael being outside of it trying his best to sound out her, and Burma's plight. Then there's the sacrifice of family for country, where a breakup of the family unit was something inevitable in order to continue being there for her countrymen and not abandoning them at times of need.

In a story spanning decades that moves forward and back in time, Besson has a solid hand in knowing the highlights of the many years history to translate for the big screen, going back to the 40s when Suu Kyi's father Aung San, a war and independence hero, got assassinated, right down to her emergence in politics as a force to be reckoned with, and her subsequent house arrest, right up to the recent 2007 rallies and demonstrations by monks that eventually led to a deadly crackdown. The Lady presents Besson an opportunity to move away from his relatively family friendly fare of late with the Arthur and the Invisibles series, and also to perform an about turn from the usual action flicks, for something a lot more serious in gravitas, and needless to say the importance of getting the film right in most, if not all counts, as much as a filmmaker can with the resources at his disposal.

As such, some may feel that the film is relatively lightweight in its coverage of politics, although I must add that being confined to one's home in the prominent years of one's political life doesn't make for a smooth translation on screen, as there's only so much that one can do within the fantastic recreation of Suu Kyi's lakeside home. Instead a softer, more heartfelt approach through a love story opened up Suu Kyi as a character who's a lot more down to earth, than just a democracy icon. Besson's knack for handling strong female characters couldn't be more pronounced here, with plenty of opportunities in scenes to show she does not cower even with gun barrels pointed at her face, nor accept the constant nonsense dished out by the military might.

Despite the lack of action, you can feel Luc Besson's release of glee in channeling that frustration to mocking the military top brass, from their deliberate big moments and silly gestures bordering on the comical, to their illogical superstitions, with characterization being very much in line with our esteemed ex Minister Mentor's comments in WikiLeaks. Almost all generalissimos and their underlings are ridiculously decorated, and make extremely naive calls as if nobody can see through their simple rouse. It's a story of grace versus guns, which in any other typical Besson movie it's no surprise if it comes with preference for the latter, except for The Lady which trades in for the softer power approach.

Michelle Yeoh lost quite a lot of weight in order to physically resemble the lead role, and her time spent on researching Suu Kyi was time well spent as she nailed her mimicry down to a pat. Even her lines spoken in Burmese were flawless. Not that I can understand the language, but the large percentage of Burmese audience that I've watched this with were nodding and acknowledging her diction and fluency, as well as her performance of the real life heroine of their lives. In short, they were in awe by her elegance and poise in making Suu Kyi come alive on screen. David Thewlis also shone in his role as the husband standing firmly behind her decision and to make sacrifices knowingly for the greater good, for the benefit of even more people in a country that needs his wife more than he needs her. Together they made their struggle felt, and will seek to move even the most stoic of hearts. And the actors who played the Burmese generals, you guys surely hammed it up effortlessly.

This superb film may be travelling the festival and commercial theatrical circuits now, and will probably pick up a slew of film awards along the way. But what's more important and I'm sure it'll achieve, is to bring the attention of the world towards Suu Kyi's, and Burma's continued plight that seemed to be with no end in sight. You may not be very familiar with what may have transpired over the decades of strife in Burma, but The Lady brings you up to speed with a succinctly packed historical lesson centered around one of the world's enduring icons of freedom and democracy. A definite recommendation for this wonderful effort.