Lincoln

Yesterday I saw Steven Spielberg's reverential costume drama about Lincoln's machinations to pass the 13th Amendment through the 1865 Congress. Daniel Day-Lewis is physically convincing as Honest Abe, though I never got used to the high, reedy voice he gave the president. The movie's Lincoln is a tall, folksy Buddha. He's consistently calm, clear-minded & slightly detached.

It's a big production, with a cast of hundreds. They must have had an impressive budget for facial hair. Diffuse & smokey lighting gives the movie a luxuriously thick atmosphere. I was impressed by a meticulous shot in which the sun's rays just peek over the roof of a building in the background. The script by Tony Kushner is almost entirely debates & conversations in which everyone speaks in complete sentences. The movie is long, & I had plenty of time to ponder if it is actually a gloss on the Obama presidency, but I did not come to any conclusions.

§ Lincoln (2012)
Director: Steven Spielberg
150 min, USA