Aseem Chhabra revisits his favourite Meryl Streep films that were showcased at the recent Berlin International Film Festival.



T here is a beautiful scene towards the end of Mike Nichols' 1983 film Silkwood. Meryl Streep's Karen Silkwood stands facing the camera (actually looking at her beau Drew Stephens, played by Kurt Russell).



She is glowing, laughing and the camera captures her in slow-motion, as she flirtatiously lifts the left side of her black leather jacket to reveal her t-shirt, but the focus seems to be on the shape of her breast. At the same moment, we hear Streep sing Amazing Grace -- it's just her haunting melodious voice, no music.

In that last shot of Silkwood, Streep looks playful, vivacious and tremendously sexy. In the 1980s, my 20-something self was madly in love with Streep.



I believed in every character she played, laughed, felt their pain and cried with them -- especially cried. Meryl Streep taught me that crying while watching films could be one of life's most emotionally satisfying experiences. I remember crying watching her as the tortured Sophie in Alan J Pakula's Sophie's Choice and as the tremendously lonely Karen Bixen in Out of Africa.



I also remember shedding a few tears for Streep's Joanna Kramer in Robert Benton's Kramer vs Kramer -- an unhappy woman, who first abandons her child, but then comes back to seek his custody. The sadder her roles were, the more I felt drawn to her, as an actress, as a person.