LINCOLN

Twentieth-Century Fox

Rated PG-13

Running time: 150 Minutes




Click below to watch the Lincoln trailer.



In Twentieth-Century Fox's Lincoln, United States President Abraham Lincoln, Daniel Day-Lewis, tries to get the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution passed in Congress to abolish slavery in this country as the American Civil War continues to rage.

Produced and Directed by Steven Spielberg, and based on the book Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin, the film covers the final four months of Lincoln's life in 1865. This was a tour de force for Daniel Day-Lewis. For an Englishman, Day-Lewis had quite a presence as the American President Lincoln. I loved it when Lincoln/Day-Lewis started telling his stories. One of my favorite scenes was where Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, Bruce McGill, complains that Lincoln/Day-Lewis is going to tell another one of his stories again and walks out as Day-Lewis tells his story. Sally Field's performance as Lincoln's wife Mary Todd Lincoln did not make me feel that she was the emotionally difficult woman that history had made her out to be, but just as a concerned wife and mother - especially when her oldest son Robert Todd Lincoln, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, wants to go enlist into the Army. She is just concerned about her family.

While there were two issues during Lincoln's Presidency, the main story in the movie was the campaign for the necessary Democratic votes in Congress for the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution for the abolition of slavery in America as a prelude to ending the Civil War. It is curious that Lincoln/Day-Lewis offered Federal jobs in his second term to the various Democratic congressmen in exchange for voting for the Amendment. There were heated debates on both sides in Congress, and even debates within his own cabinet, while Lincoln's people try to secure the votes necessary to pass the Amendment. There was even the joke about eventually giving women the right to vote, to the horror of everyone. During the vote for the Amendment, the names were changed on those in the United States House of Representatives who voted No on the Amendment to spare the family descendants of these representatives. There were several statements to the effect that the world is watching them, but you saw no actual scenes of the outside world. The scenes were totally focused on the American events. It is curious that I have always thought that it was the Democrats that supported the Amendment instead of the Republicans.

There was a battle scene at the beginning of the movie which to me was the most graphic Civil War battle scene I have ever seen, due to the fact that the fighting was basically hand to hand instead of people shooting at each other across a field. Half of the soldiers fighting in the scene were black. This battle scene was basically the only battle scene in the movie, despite what the trailer may imply - as the rest of the movie was about the politics of the 13th Amendment and the little known peace agreement between the Union and the Confederacy. This scene makes me incredibly sad as I realize that these are Americans fighting Americans.

The theme of the movie was Euclid's theory - which Lincoln/Day-Lewis spoke of - which is basically "Things which equal the same thing also equal one another." That was the basis of abolishing slavery. That was like a light bulb for me when Day-Lewis spoke of this. To think of the black people as unequal in the eyes of God was very prejudiced. Although the slaves in the movie acted and were treated more like servants rather than slaves doing drudge work, especially when there were black people for Lincoln/Day-Lewis and Sally Field. Although the pictures of black children of which their son Tad Lincoln, Gulliver McGrath, had with prices on their pictures brought home the idea of slavery. Tommy Lee Jones was great as Republican Abolitionist Thaddeus Stevens. There was a scene at the end of the movie that made me understand Thaddeus Stevens/Jones better.

This was a long movie, especially with the long speeches at the beginning of the movie. I know that at least one couple left at the end of the voting for the 13th Amendment - and there was still the rest of the story of Lincoln to be told. The long speeches in the beginning made it difficult for me to concentrate as there was too much information being thrown at me and I was ready to fall asleep, but visually the movie was great under Spielberg's direction. There was a stylistic dream sequence in the beginning of the movie of a style that I have not really seen before. Lincoln's famous Gettysburg Address in the beginning of the movie was too Hollywood for me for it to be believable, but it was a nice idea. With all the historical research that was involved, as the end credits indicated of all the museums and archives that were listed,  it makes you wonder how much has been done for Hollywood's sake and how much in depth history has been left out.

I saw the movie at a Black Friday matinee in it's second week. I just realized, it seemed rather appropriate to see it on that day. The theater was full with a more mature audience than the young people who normally go to the movies. At the end of the movie, everyone applauded - and where normally people immediately leave after a movie, there were several people staying behind and just talking about the movie while the end credits rolled. It felt more like a social event. When the movie was over, there was a line outside the door.

Rated PG-13 for violence and language. Running time: 150 Minutes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

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