When "Lincoln" began, I was very, very surprised. I had assumed the film was a traditional biography of the man, but instead it started late in the Civil War--only months before Abe Lincoln's assassination. That's because despite the title, the film really is about Lincoln and his attempts to push the 13th Amendment through the House of Representatives. Apparently, its passage was very, very difficult--even with a Congress made up exclusively of states that were not part of the Confederacy. The film shows, step-by-step, how the behind the scenes machinations (some of which were of dubious legality--such as offering bribes) led to its passage.

So is this a good film and who is the audience? Well, it's actually an exceptional film in many ways. The acting by Daniel Day-Lewis is wonderful but more wonderful is the care to historical details. The film shows, for the first time, that Lincoln was a very human man--very astute and tricky in politics, prone to depression and anger and not the saint-like guy you usually see in films. It also shows that, at least for the North, that the war was NOT about slavery--and even when the war was all but won, many still would have had no problem allowing slavery to continue. These are very important as they help give a truer picture of the man and the times. The only thing that didn't ring particularly true was the little speech Mary Todd Lincoln made late in the film. The comment about how the future will view her seems ridiculous, as people just don't talk that way. And, whether she was clinically insane or not, she did have serious problems with depression, erratic behavior and all around nastiness! I don't know why the film tried so hard to clean up her image. Still, from the standpoint of an ex-American history teacher, it was a delight. Unfortunately, I really am not sure how much the average non-history buff would view the film--as it is slow and lacks a lot of action. Still, it is a really exceptional film.

By the way, I really loved seeing Secretary Stanton freak out when Lincoln was about to tell another one of his stories! Watch the film--you'll see what I mean.

Much of Stephen Spielberg's output I do like very much. Not all his films post-Saving Private Ryan have been great, but there have been a handful that have been and Lincoln is one of them. I can though understand why some wouldn't like it, the first hour is lengthy and slow as well as quite talky. I think it may also depend on how much you know about Abraham Lincoln and the 13th Amendment, in the case of my mother she found the film interesting but because she didn't know much about the subject she didn't always find it easy to follow.

Admittedly my knowledge of it consists of knowing the basic facts but not the full picture. I cannot say whether it stretches the truth or whether it is accurate, but that wouldn't have mattered much to me as I found myself captivated. Lincoln is not a flawless film, aside from the slow pacing in the first half I did feel that more could have been done with the ending, that had potential to be very moving but the idea to have something else going on during that fateful event and then rushing through the aftermath for me undermined the emotional impact and how much we cared about what happened. Of course we do, here though we just don't have enough time to express it.

That said, it is a very well made film, and Spielberg directs superbly. The sets, costumes and atmosphere look both gritty and beautiful, and everything is very evocative. The battle scenes are scarce but, the beginning scene in particular, there are hints of the gut-wrenching realism that we saw in Saving Private Ryan. John Williams' score is haunting and understated. There may not be a main theme that everybody will remember strictly speaking but Williams has always had the ability to boost a bad/not-so-good film a notch or two and I cannot deny how beautifully composed the score for Lincoln is.

Lincoln is very well written as well. There is a lot of dialogue, but it is very rich and intelligent with the verbal sway in the courtroom also entertaining. The story picks up after the first half, which still had its interesting points, don't get me wrong, with the courtroom scenes compelling(the final one when the Amendment is passed was the best one) and the scene with Lincoln and his wife talking about the loss of their son affecting without being too mawkish. And I think those who lost a loved one but don't talk about their grief will really relate to it, it may not be the case for some but that was the vibe I got from watching that scene in Lincoln.

Daniel Day Lewis is mesmerising, he won the Best Actor Oscar for his performance and it was more than well-deserved. He had a difficult task of trying to make a major historical figure authentic. He does that just by his enigmatic presence and penetrating eyes alone, it is a very authoritative and thoughtful performance. He is very well supported by a large- perhaps by some people too large- cast. Some can have a tendency to speak it a little too quickly but the intent is there and I can definitely understand why, having to do assessed college presentations I've been in that boat. Sally Field makes the most of a rather unsympathetic role, which may have been a reason for why some didn't like her performance, I thought she gave her all and her rapport with Day Lewis is strong. Tommy Lee Jones has the juiciest dialogue of the film(some of it had me quietly chuckling actually),and he relishes it in one of his best supporting performances in recent years.

Overall, a great film but understandably it is one that not everybody is going to be thrilled by. 9/10 Bethany Cox

Stephen Spielberg did some meticulous research or maybe I should say that Doris Kearns Goodwin did some for him when she wrote her best seller Team Of Rivals about Lincoln and his Cabinet during the Civil War. Otherwise Lincoln the film wouldn't be a film destined to win a lot of awards next year. Spielberg had it all down, including the club foot that Thaddeus Stevens had.

By the time that 1865 rolled around a most war weary public just wanted an end and they could see it in sight with Grant battering Lee in Virginia and taking some heavy casualties every time out and Sherman coming up from Georgia through the Carolinas after Joe Johnston. However the man in the White House had a deeper concern, he wanted something out of the war, something lasting. Like an end to slavery once and for all.

So with the Confederates looking to salvage their Slaveocracy and sending peace commissioners and the Radical Republicans like Charles Sumner in the Senate and Thaddeus Stevens in the House wanting abolition once and for all, Lincoln steered a tricky course through public opinion to get the 13th amendment to the Constitution abolishing slavery.

In a nutshell the film Lincoln is about one of the lines from his famous Gettysburg Address. Abraham Lincoln wanted to know in his heart that the people he memorialized, who lay beneath the soil at Gettysburg, died for a noble purpose. As he said on that occasion, "these dead shall not have died in vain".

Not everyone in politics is in it for anything noble however and the President of the United States had more in the way of patronage to make things happen that he wanted. God only knows for instance what Lyndon Johnson had to offer to bring a few votes along to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Not everyone voted for that strictly to memorialize the late John F. Kennedy. Lincoln was an old hand at that from his years in Illinois.

Daniel Day-Lewis and Sally Field make a splendid Abe and Mary Lincoln and Spielberg gave us enough of a view of the home life at the White House with the two surviving sons. Robert Lincoln who was more his mother's son than his father's except he inherited Lincoln's ability as a lawyer wanted very much to serve in the Civil War. But Mary Lincoln lost her two boys between Robert and Tad and did not want to lose her oldest in the war. So Robert unlike his father who studied law by candlelight and clerked, got a Harvard education instead. Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays Robert and young Gulliver McGrath plays the mischievous Thomas Todd 'Tad' Lincoln.

Of the supporting cast Thaddeus Stevens as played by Tommy Lee Jones is most memorable. Stevens who unofficially led the Radicals was a man way ahead of his time. His 'housekeeper' was a black woman with whom he had two daughters whom he could not marry because of miscegenation laws. He wanted full equality for all and did not care who knew it. Later on he led the effort to impeach Lincoln's successor Andrew Johnson who as Vice President-elect plays no role here as most Vice Presidents do. That whole story is told albeit with a different historical slant in the film Tennessee Johnson with Van Heflin as Johnson and Lionel Barrymore as Stevens.

I think the only question remaining is how many Oscars Lincoln will pick up next year.