LINCOLN MOVIE (REVIEW)
I read my first Lincoln book as a teenager and my interest in this fascinating person has only grown over the years since then.They say more books have been written on Abraham Lincoln than anyone except Jesus. I have continued to read and learn, and have been to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington. So for the last two years the film I was most eagerly awaiting was LINCOLN, by Steven Spielberg, no less.
My first overall impression was that this is indeed, a Spielberg picture, encompassing the best and worst of that tradition. He has chosen to focus on the last months of Lincoln's life, when, newly re-elected, he added the passing of the 13th amendment to the constitution to the momentous task of concluding the civil war. The film is a political thriller of the fight to pass the amendment which would abolish slavery. And we will meet a less iconic, more human (and deviously political) “Honest Abe.”
There have been similar movies about political machinations like ADVISE AND CONSENT, THE BEST MAN and others that were, frankly, more involving and, well, better. Spielberg is here at his antiseptic best. I always remember the scene in THE COLOR PURPLE, where Whoopi Goldberg enters Danny Glover's home for the first time. It's a total disaster of a mess, a pig sty of a mess. She walks through the garbage and things but you never saw such an organized mess. It was designed rather than have a chaotic haphazard look to it. You could see the nice path made out for her to walk through. Similarly the opposing forces in the political debate here are antiseptic, too civilized to capture the harshly negative politics of the day. This renders us passive spectators rather than riled up observers. Even a well done courtroom drama has more engaging drama. LINCOLN las a long drawnout middle that could have been expanded in scope or cut altogether.
If I had my way Mr. Spielberg would have more Academy Awards than he has now, for JAWS, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, JURASSIC PARK and others. But there is something about his dramas about reality that I find lacking. He tackles great subjects but then Spielbergs them down. What is most important is what we bring to these “serious” movies of his as an audience. He unwittingly counts on our feelings toward his subjects to ease his path as storyteller. He counts too much on our preconceived ideas and just tells the story, reinforcing our views, rather than earning any increased feelings on our part.
For me the best example of this is SCHINDLER'S LIST. My recollection of seeing the film is of sitting there most of the time with tears running down my face while consiously thinking “This isn't really very good.” The tears were a result of what I brought with me to the theatre on his subject and not as much earned by him. He merely played the violin accompaniment to my preexisting feelings. He should have magnified, intensified those feelings, not exploited them. He did not do on the subject what THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK or JUDGMENT AT NUREMBERG were able to do. It is as if he is in awe rather than master of some subjects, and LINCOLN unfortunately falls into that category.
There is an early scene in LINCOLN where common soldiers meet him and I found it extremely moving. But it was to be the only such scene, and being the second one in the film, I now think it was mostly due to what I had brought with me to the theatre. I have seen a good many PBS documentaries on Lincoln including Ken Burns' THE CIVIL WAR series that were more moving and informative on Lincoln than this film, which could have been called LINCOLN LITE. Maybe Spielberg assumes a knowledge of Lincoln on the part of the audience that is unrealistic. Who knew about Lawrence of Arabia before seeing that film? But we got a seemingly complete profile of the man.
Example: Lincoln was tormented by his marriage. His politically supportive wife was emotionally unstable. They have only one huge fight scene that must seem shocking to viewers unfamiliar with Mary Todd Lincoln. She went on spending sprees nearly bankrupting him, which is here unmentioned, yet a major cause of their fights. She was a Southerner who believed in the Northern cause, abandoned by most family and friends but this is not mentioned, though it would make her more sympathetic. Both of these points could have been covered quickly in dialogue. The loss of her son in the White House a few years earlier is mentioned, but in a soap opera manner.
Instead, she is this character who is often “just there.” She's in the spectator section of the House of Representatives while they debate the amendment, doing and saying nothing, just watching or frowning. She has a very personal conversation with her elder son in the hallway of the White House in front of the usual office seekers and lobbyists. It's a calm scene that could have easily been held in private, but she wouldn't have been as much “on.”
For a film about slavery, there's not much here about contemporary feelings on the subject- you're for it or against it as a legislator. There is no mention of the riots in New York City where citizens hung black people at random, blaming them for the civil war, which was so graphically shown in Scorcese's GANGS OF NEW YORK. Mary Lincoln has an assistant, a lady-in-waiting black companion she presumably confides in but that isn't really shown. We know that Lincoln was against slavery from an early age, but had no encounters with black people until as President he met Frederick Douglas and came to see that equality between the races was not limited only to their souls, but to intelligence, ability and all else as well. Instead if showing one of these meetings with Douglas, we see Lincoln in an awkward scene with his wife's assistant on the front steps of the White House that doesn't add up to much. Maybe this scene most shows the film's lost opportunities.
All that said, there is much to praise as well. The art direction and set decoration, photography (light your house with 1865 lighting and that's what you'd get too) and the editing works well. The costumes are good without being showy. Lincoln's pants are not crisply pressed, I noticed, and look lived in. He walks like someone who had done a lot of physical labor in his life and as someone who had immense burdens to bear. The civil war is background and well served with just two scenes- the opening battle scene, and an amputation scene not easily forgotten. But sadly, this is the first teaming of John Williams and Spielberg where the music is pretty blah and boring.
Daniel Day Lewis does a magnificent job portraying the great emancipator. He holds the film together, and plays it differently than others who have tackled it. Perhaps, like Hamlet, Lincoln will be interpreted according to each generation's focus and needs. He plays a person rather than icon, though Lincoln speaking four-letter words is a humanizing surprise. Maybe Gregory Peck did Lincoln better in TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, but that's another issue. We know that Lincoln had a high-pitched voice for a six foot-four tall person, but at times Day Lewis seems to be doing Lincoln by channelling Walter Brennan. No President suffered personally as much as Lincoln- war, wife, colleagues, grief, or aged as much in office. I would have liked to have been told he was only 56 when he died. In his last photos he looked 76.
The supporting cast is excellent. I don't know why Edwin M. Stanton, Lincoln's Secretary of War didn't have a larger role in the film. He was the closest thing to Dick Cheney in the 1860s and an interesting character. When fired by Lincoln's successor he barricaded and armed himself in his office and refused to go. Lincoln was surrounded by people who thought him an unworthy President, a hick in office, and this makes Lincoln's job all the harder and his accomplishments all the more remarkable. This film is based on the best-seller TEAM OF RIVALS by Doris Kearns Goodwin, which is all about that burden he bore.
This brings us to Sally Field as Lincoln's wife, the only weak actor in the film. I'm not a big fan of the scenery-chewer in any event, but she's Sally Field reprising most roles we've seen her in rather than Mary Todd Lincoln. A little less NORMA RAYE and a lot more STEEL MAGNOLIAS would have served the film better.
When it comes to reviewing films I've always thought It's unfair to review the film it could have been rather than the film that was made, but this one is a cinematic disappointment despite some fine things in it. I don't know what younger audiences will make of it. Maybe they'd prefer the Vampire Hunter Lincoln? They will likely be bored by the drawn out details of the political battle (the film is almost three hours long) but any who do go will learn something about the man and his times. I read about one screening, where as the end credits started rolling someone shouted out in the audience “Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty we're free at last”, commenting on the film's length. It was reported that many in the audience greeted his remark with applause.
