First of all, I feel the need to quickly defend my choice to discuss “Lincoln” over some of the other movies currently in theaters.
While “Skyfall” was a very tempting choice, it’s been out for more than 20 days now, and that doesn’t exactly fall under the category of “recent release.” Remove the movies that are either unappealing to the general college audience (“Wreck-it Ralph”), remakes of movies that weren’t very good movies originally in the ‘80s (“Red Dawn”) or “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2” (and there was absolutely no way I was putting myself through that, sorry teenage female audience), and I was left with a choice between “Life of Pi” and “Lincoln.” Unfortunately for “Life of Pi,” I listened to my inner American and decided on “Lincoln.”
Now I’m not saying you’re not a good American citizen if you don’t go see “Lincoln,” but you should probably at least pretend to feel a tiny bit guilty if you haven’t seen it yet. Not only is it a great depiction of one of our most famous presidents, it’s also an overall very powerful movie, and you might accidentally learn something, which is the best kind of learning.
“Lincoln” covers the life of Abraham Lincoln between The Emancipation Proclamation and his assassination at Ford’s Theatre. It’s centered on his battle in the House of Representatives to pass the 13th Amendment, which outlawed slavery. The Civil War is still raging in the South, where the Confederates are mostly beaten but refusing to unconditionally surrender. Lincoln is also battling a war at home against the general insanity of Mary Todd Lincoln after the loss of one of their sons. Meanwhile, his oldest son, Robert, desires to take up arms for fear of looking a coward.
The strength of the film is the powerful performance delivered by Daniel Day-Lewis as Lincoln. Day-Lewis’ performance bundles everything you’ve ever imagined Lincoln to be and gives it life onscreen. His mannerisms are exact: he speaks how we would imagine Lincoln did, and even includes Lincoln’s aptitude for telling anecdotal stories during tense moments. As of this moment, Day-Lewis knocks off Denzel Washington and places himself atop my leader board for best leading actor come Oscar time.
Day-Lewis is complimented by a great performance from Sally Field as Mary Todd Lincoln, as well as an inspiring performance from Tommy Lee Jones as Thaddeus Stevens, the leader of the radical sect of the Republican Party. Relatively unknown Lee Pace turned in a great performance as Fernando Wood, a staunch Democrat from New York.
There are very few negative points to the movie, but it does seem to drag slightly in parts, which is almost to be expected with a 150-minute runtime. The Robert Lincoln (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt) storyline seemed mostly unnecessary, and while it may have been important to the life of Lincoln, it didn’t seem to add anything to the story being told in the film, as most of the action is centered on the actions being taken to pass the 13th Amendment.
There are also a few interesting choices in setting during the movie, both centered on being in a theater. In a movie about the life of Abraham Lincoln, there’s a certain expectation people have when you suddenly place him in the balcony of a theater. A very minor instance of this occurs about halfway through the film, when there was no way the assassination would take place. Nothing happens, so it ends up being an unnecessarily tense moment that did nothing for the overall story other than set up Abraham and Mary Todd’s enjoyment of theater.
The second and actually significant theater scene, however, was incredibly irksome. This may or may not be a spoiler, so if you’re actually afraid of one, stop reading. We all know John Wilkes Booth assassinated Lincoln in Ford’s Theater shortly after the amendment passes, so while you’re waiting for the gunshot, the theater manager runs onstage and announces that the president has been shot, while the camera pans to Tad Lincoln (his youngest son) crying in the audience.
Director Steven Spielberg, in [an interview with Collider.com](http://collider.com/daniel-day-lewis-steven-spielberg-lincoln-interview/206820/), claimed that his choice to not show the assassination came from “not wanting to exploit the assassination.” Sure, Steven, you just threw in two theater scenes to not exploit the assassination? Right.
Despite my minor annoyance with Spielberg (I’m still mad about “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull”), “Lincoln” deserves at least 4.5 stars out of 5. As I’ve said, it’s an incredibly powerful movie about one of the most important men in American history, and seeing Day-Lewis’ outstanding performance as Lincoln is well worth the time.
