Steven Spielberg's Lincoln (2012): A Review From a Fan of the Historic Lincoln

Patriotic feeling showered over me after leaving a showing of Lincoln at a local AMC theater last night. I was also filled with a heavy sorrow over the ghastly sacrifices our forefathers made to make this country great. Exiting the theater in my presence was a group of teenagers muttering amongst themselves, "That was a lame movie." Looking at them, my sorrow grew heavier as I realized those ghastly sacrifices made by our forefathers were made so that shallow creatures such as these may live for the great and noble purpose of killing zombies in computer games, impregnating young ladies before abandoning the responsibility following their actions, and generally taking up space in a number of other - useless - ways. Perhaps those numbskulls remembered watching Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter a year ago, mistook it for the real Abe Lincoln, and were expecting something similar from Spielberg. If you're looking for action and suspense, see the latest Bond movie instead. But if you're looking for a film to learn something from, do not miss Lincoln.


Exactly what do you learn from a film like this? As an avid reader of history, I can tell you with one hundred percent sincerity that I believe Spielberg represents Lincoln and the people of his times accurately and responsibly. Taking the battle for passage of the Thirteenth Amendment (which forever abolished the practice of slavery in the United States) as the focal point of the story's events, Spielberg slays the mythology that Lincoln freed slaves only to pack his armies with more soldiers to wage the Civil War. If that were true, Lincoln's efforts to free African Americans would have ended with the Emancipation Proclamation (January 1863), which was a temporary, wartime measure intended to undermine the capacity of the Confederacy to continue the war. On the contrary, Lincoln placed his own re-election and a speedy end of the war in jeopardy, to further the work of the Emancipation Proclamation by pushing for a constitutional amendment that would forever extinguish slavery.

Setting history straight is not the only virtue of this film. Superb, Oscar-worthy performances abound throughout Lincoln.  Daniel Day-Lewis looks exactly the way Lincoln is portrayed in photographs and behaves exactly the way Lincoln is described by contemporaries. The historic Lincoln's homey mannerisms and sometimes off-color jokes are on vibrant display in Lewis' rendering. The fiery, anguished, emotion-drenched Mary Todd Lincoln could not be more effectively brought to life by anyone other than by the magnificent Sally Field. The rugged, idealistic, Congressional abolitionist Thaddeus Stevens nearly steals the show in Tommy Lee Jones' masterful hands.

The sometimes tedious political discourse in the film is navigable if you understand a few concepts. In the context of the Civil War period, Democrats wanted to leave slavery alone and just end the war with or without victory. "Conservative Republicans" did not like slavery, but were unenthusiastic about freeing slaves as a necessary means of winning the war. "Radical Republicans" (like Thaddeus Stevens) were crusaders for social justice who cared more about destroying slavery and righting the social wrongs of American culture than about winning the war or preserving the Union. If anything, they wanted to wage the war to forge a new Union based on equality for all. Lincoln's success was based in no small measure on the ability to bring these two hostile wings of his party together to advance the twin goals of social justice and preservation of the Union. To achieve bipartisan support for his goals, Lincoln offered government jobs to lame-duck Democrats who had been turned out of office during the November 1864 election but were still voting in Congress until their term expired. Did this amount to bribery? Not in the way bribery was punishable in those days.

In sum, Spielberg's Lincoln is a badly needed correction to the mythology perpetrated by those scholars (Thomas Di Lorenzo, for one) who believe Lincoln was driven by cynical, political calculations rather than by moral values centered on social justice. It is also a refreshing example of what great acting looks and sounds like in an age when fast action and cutting-edge special affects drown-out characters and relationships in typical Hollywood films. Finally, Lincoln showcases the qualities of leadership most-needed and most sorely-lacking in our current political culture namely, the willingness to reach across the aisle, look for common ground, and accomplish something for the greater good of our society. In the current battle over the "fiscal cliff" House Speaker John Boehner and President Barack Obama ought to take notes from Steven Spielberg's Lincoln.

Jason A.