Jack Kroll

“Thanks to Meryl Streep's brilliant characterization of Silkwood, we feel this awakening in our own, nonradioactive bones. Her Silkwood is no Okie version of Joan of Arc. She's a chain-smoking, hip-swinging, hair-mussing, wise-cracking girl who's careless about safety rules, swipes food from her co-workers' plates and flashes her bosom at gawking males. But the writers, Nichols and especially Streep turn this selfish "pain in the ass" into the complicated human being that she was, a girl who wanted to study science, who left three children behind with her separated common-law husband. Beyond these details Streep shows us a smart, sensitive woman with the constant jitters that come from deep frustration. It's a devastating irony that Silkwood only found a focus for her character and intelligence when she was contaminated by radioactivity.

“. . . . Nichols's handling of an outstanding cast is superbly sensitive. . . .

Jack Kroll
Newsweek, December 12, 1983