'Lincoln' review by Captain Raptor

'Lincoln' review by Captain Raptor

I hope I'm not rocking the boat with this opinion, but Steven Spielberg is good. Incredibly good. So when a director of Spielberg's magnitude teams up with a dual-Oscar winning actor to present the tale of one of America's most revered historical figures, the expectations are pretty damn high. I'm not a fan of biopics, on the basis that real life is only rarely more interesting that fictitious events, but given that Honest Abe is the President who oversaw the abolition of slavery and the American Civil War, I put aside my preconceptions and went to see Daniel Day-Lewis and friends at the cinema. My mind hasn't been wholly changed.

The biggest problem with Lincoln is, strangely, Lincoln. Despite the considerable talents of Daniel Day-Lewis (which shine through occasionally when Lincoln argues with his wife or tells an anecdote to an awed crowd), the actual character of Lincoln is dull and lifeless. Unwilling to portray the bearded leader as anything other than the perfect, just man of American legends, the Lincoln in this film has no flaws, no personality traits, nothing to make him a character worth watching. He is emotionally restrained to the point of total blankness; for a man purportedly shocked by the horrors of slavery, he rarely seems to be angry or upset over the subject. The film's other biggest flaw is the lack of actual slavery: this is the typical Hollywood method of showing racial prejudice that I complained about in my Django Unchained review, i.e. showing it from the perspective of a bunch of liberal white people. It angers me that a film like Django Unchained which portrays an engaging and heroic black character fighting back against the oppressive slavers receives accusations of racism because of its abundance of racial slurs (which is probably accurate for the time period) but Lincoln, a supposedly more serious film about slavery, contains very few black characters - those that do appear have almost no lines, and no characterization, their main purpose is to get teary-eyed and appreciate the heroic white folk - and nobody bats an eyelid. On a lesser note, the film's soundtrack is disappointingly bland, which I normally wouldn't care much about, but the score is done by cinematic music master John Williams, so I expected something grand and memorable.

It's not all bad. What Lincoln lacks in its story and portrayal of the central character it makes up for with astounding supporting performances. Tommy Lee Jones is on fire as the disgruntled, dedicated abolitionist Thaddeus Stevens, and there are equally brilliant performances from Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Lincoln's son torn between doing his war duty and obeying his father), David Strathairn (the obedient but angered Secretary of State) and Sally Field (Lincoln's depressed and put-upon wife). When these characters are leading the scenes, the on-screen drama gets ramped up, and we get to see the emotion that a film like this desperately needs. And if anybody deserves a special mention, it is surely Jackie Earle Haley - the actor perhaps best known for playing Freddy Krueger somehow manages to give his pro-slavery politician a rational and vaguely sympathetic point of view, and a nicely subtle performance to match. As good as he is, this also makes it all the more irritating that no attention is given to the actual slaves. 

Lincoln is an oddity of a film. It has a phenomenal cast and crew, yet seems so in love with its subject matter that it often forgets to be entertaining. A great performance from Day-Lewis is wasted on a poor script, and it's only the multitude of fantastic actors in supporting roles (I am honour bound to also mention James Spader and Walton Goggins, because they were great in small roles but I haven't yet commended them) that carries the film away from tedium. Normally, I would give Lincoln a slight recommendation, but given that Django Unchained is currently in cinemas you'd be a fool to see Lincoln instead - Django Unchained is better both as a film in general, and as an insight into slavery. I cannot tell a lie - I do not recommend this film.