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Created Apr 04, 2011 08:52PM PST • Edited Feb 08, 2015 11:23PM PST

1. Quality

2. Summary

   Good 3.0

   Message-movies that dramatize real world events start with two strikes against them. The message they promote likely doesn’t resonate with everyone. And they have to hew to an often humdrum storyline.

   Thus Made in Dagenham is a pleasant surprise, quirky instead of humdrum, not heavy-handed, and well performed.

   Unfortunately it only tells part of the real story. While women certainly deserve equal pay for equal work, the strike the movie depicts was one of several during the same period, making the Dagenham plant an unreliable contributor to Ford’s production. Thus no cars are made there anymore, even if engines are.

   It turns out the real world is different than the movies. For instance, here the real ending was hardly happy.

4. Acting

   Very Good 3.5

   Sally Hawkins utterly charms as the working wife and mother who leads Britain’s women on a campaign for equal wages.

   Also jumping off screen are Bob Hoskins as a helpful union functionary, Rosamund Pike as a glamorous wife of an executive, and Miranda Richardson as an ultimately helpful cabinet secretary.

5. Male Stars Good 3.0

6. Female Stars Great 4.0

7. Female Costars Great 4.0

8. Male Costars Good 3.0

10. Film

    Good 3.0

11. Direction Very Good 3.5

12. Play Good 3.0

13. Music Good 3.0

14. Visuals Very Good 3.5
15. Content

16. Edge

    Tame 1.2

17. Sex Innocent 1.2

18. Violence Gentle 1.0

19. Rudeness Polite 1.5

21. Reality

    Glib 1.1

22. Circumstantial Glib 1.4

23. Biological Natural 1.0

24. Physical Natural 1.0