A fearless pro-democracy advocate is given a pedestrian biopic in The Lady.

On 23 April, 2012 Nobel Peace Prize winner and Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi will sit in parliament after spending fifteen of the last twenty one years in house arrest for daring to champion democracy and stand against the ruthless military government in Burma.

During that time Suu Kyi has garnered much support and admiration from the international community. Among them is French filmmaker Luc Besson, who after Suu Kyi’s release from house arrest in 2010 proceeded to make this biopic. Unfortunately, Besson has created a film that fails to adequately portray Suu Kyi’s courage, politics and spirit.

Michelle Yeoh takes on the role of Suu Kyi, a Burmese born Oxford housewife who returns to her homeland to take care of her mother only to feel compelled to stand up for the voiceless Burmese who suffer under the strong arm of the tyrannical military government.

While Yeoh looks the part, her portrayal of Suu Kyi is bland with too much poise and not enough emotion creating a stoic figure where rare spurts of emotion feels forced. Too often this critic found himself wishing that Yeoh would whip out a sword and lay her captors to waste Crouching Tiger style. Needless to say this is not a good thing.

Coming off much better is David Thewlis as Suu Kyi’s late husband Michael Aris. Instead of focusing more on Suu Kyi’s political exploits, Besson decided to focus on the “human story” of a marriage under strain by extraordinary circumstances. But in doing so Besson inadvertently loses his goal of presenting Suu Kyi’s plight and instead makes Aris the only figure worth investing in, with Thewlis delivering an excellent performance as the man behind “The Lady”.

As far as biopics stand Besson has spared no expense in creating as authentic and presentable a movie as he could with The Lady. Yet he has failed to tap into that sense of outrage, sadness and hope that a story like this should conjure.

The presentation of these true events feel formulaic and flaccid, with Besson riding basic biopic conventions for all their worth, and in these days where biopics have to be innovative to be effective it just doesn’t work.

There is much to admire about Aung San Suu Kyi. Her strength, patience, spirit and fearlessness saw her adversaries bested and gave the world hope. The Lady will only inspire the occasional yawn.