You can't justify nasty behavior.

Rating: 4/10 (12 June 2016)

Meryl Streep has the hands which rock the cradle, and no matter how magnificent she is, you can't escape the fact that this script promotes a real wretched view of women in power. Leona Helmsley may have been a piece of work to be employed by, but she got her come uppance through horrid publicity. Streep's Miranda Priestly is a woman who has clawed their way up to the top, and obviously has a hatred towards other women, even though she sees something in naive Anne Hathaway whom she treats with disdain even though she secretly creates plans to help her rise, bringing on ethical issues for Hathaway.
I can see that Streep is having a ball in this part, barking orders and acting more imperious than an empress, tossing her designer coats on Hathaway's desk to hang up without as much as a greeting. A montage of her entrances shows what a wretched, unhappy woman Streep's character is, and in a few moments, unleashes her guard with Anne, eventually coming to depend on her while she crushes Blunt with her thumb. You really have to have nerves of steel to tolerate such degrading treatments, and Hathaway empathizes her vulnerability while never loosing a sense of who she is even though it seems that the world is being handed to her on a silver platter.
Women in business are of a certain mindset and there are those who nurture and those who bully. I've had both, and there really is no justification for the pretentiousness that consumes the industry that this is set in. All this did for me was leave an element of disgust for these archetypes (male or female) who will find their day of reckoning. These are people who are miserable outside of their careers, and along with Streep, there's snooty Stanley Tucci who is the Devil has a pickle puss and Emily Blunt as a walking nervous breakdown. I see these characters every day walking to work on Park Avenue, and am disgusted by the reality as well as the fiction. This is a disappointment because it tries to justify a lifestyle that really needs an attitude adjustment.