Oscar Watch: "Lincoln"

Lincoln is the portrait of a man, told through a month of his life. Actions speak louder than words. For a film that's very much based on words and using them to achieve a means, we don't hear many famous speeches from Lincoln. Instead, we get more intimate conversations with the man. Conversations with his wife, with his son. Stories told to family, friends, and colleagues. Jokes he made. You feel like, at the end of this film, you almost know Lincoln as a person. And in this, Steven Spielberg has succeeded in strong fashion, I think. It would have been nice to see a biography of Lincoln, his coming up, his early days of presidency. Instead, what we have is a portrait not only of a historical figure, shrouded in legend, but a man, flesh and blood. A man who strived hard for what he believed, suffered silently through grief and sorrow to lead a nation.

It almost goes without saying that Daniel Day-Lewis did a stellar job acting. The best I can say is that I felt like I saw Lincoln right in front of me. I was anticipating this film for years, since I heard Spielberg was attached, and Liam Neeson as well at the time. But when Neeson dropped and I heard Day-Lewis took the role, I was even more excited. Although his voice surprised me, I felt its higher pitch made him more of a human figure. No deep baritone like I expected. Field was also very, very strong as a woman suffering. The film was shot in a way that made it feel older, and John Williams's music was surpassingly very understated, supporting the film when needed, but not ever-present.

This movie also showed the struggles our country went to, to abolish something so hindsightedly obvious as equality. Our county has always had struggles, political and military and otherwise. Spielberg focused on the political struggle, the complexity of people, how they make decisions, the prejudices they have, and the uphill battles some fight for what they believe. Jones portrayed this so well as Stevens, and added a good amount of his characteristic humor to it. I hope he wins an award for this role, because he was stellar, and finding out his love was black at the end was even better in terms of fleshing out his character. Because first, you think it's ironic that a man against slavery has slaves, and then you see it's actually his love.

For a film that's about 2.5 hours long, it moves surprisingly fast. It's a skillfully edited film, showcasing good dialogue and good acting. That's what you need to make a good film, and this may be a master class is many examples of quality filmmaking. It also makes me want to read up on the history presented. The end was sad, with Lincoln's death. I think I may have not shown that, and ended with him walking. Directorial choice, I suppose. But overall, very good film, and I'm surprisingly glad at how it showed so much about a time and a person despite focusing on a month of actual time.

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