Lincoln movie summary

I've rarely been more aware than during Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln" that Abraham Lincoln was a plain-spoken, practical, down-to-earth man from the farmlands of Kentucky, lincoln movie summary, Indiana and Illinois. He had less than a year of formal education and taught himself through his hungry reading of great books. I still recall from a childhood book the image of him lincoln movie summary a piece of charcoal and working out mathematics by writing on the back of a shovel. Lincoln lacked social polish but he had great intelligence and knowledge of human nature.

Conor R-S Period 6. Lincoln Review Lincoln The movie Lincoln, directed by the infamous Steven Spielberg, is based on the life of Abraham Lincoln and his efforts to pass the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which would abolish slavery completely. With the assumption that the Civil War would end in one month, however, Abraham feels it it is imperative to pass the amendment by the end of January, thus removing any possibility that slaves who have already been freed may be re-enslaved. Radical Republicans believe the amendment will be defeated, due to the support of it not being completely assured, since they prioritize the issue of ending the war. Even if all of them are ultimately brought on board, the …show more content…. Since those members also will soon be in need of employment and Lincoln will have many federal jobs to fill as he begins his second term, he sees this as a tool he can use to his advantage.

Lincoln movie summary

S teven Spielberg has made more obviously entertaining and more emotionally seductive movies than Lincoln , but this is for him the most brave and, for the audience, most demanding picture in the 40 years since his emergence as a major director. It's a film about statesmanship, politics, the creation of the world's greatest democracy, and it's concerned with what we can learn from the study and contemplation of history. Spielberg and his eloquent screenwriter, the playwright Tony Kushner, handle these themes with flair, imagination and vitality, and Daniel Day-Lewis embodies them with an indelible intelligence as the 16th president of the United States. Lincoln begins a year before the end of the civil war with the movie's only battle scene. It's a minute of the bloody, hand-to-hand combat at Jenkins' Ferry, Arkansas, that by a brilliant piece of editing legerdemain is transformed into two black soldiers recalling the battle while talking to Lincoln about the future of the Union. The scene establishes the rock-like physical presence of the war-weary president, his warmth, modesty and humanity. The picture concludes a year later with a non-triumphalist coda that follows five days after Confederate general Robert E Lee's surrender. With immense adroitness Spielberg avoids the high drama of the actual assassination at Ford's theatre on 14 April , showing us the news being broken to Lincoln's young son, Tad, at another theatre and then bringing us to Lincoln's deathbed where secretary of war Edwin Stanton pronounces the celebrated epitaph: "Now he belongs to the ages" though he might actually have said "to the angels". This is followed by a brief concluding flashback to Lincoln's second inaugural address a month earlier, with its cautious message of hope and realism. The heart of the film is a few weeks in January in an overcast wintry Washington between Lincoln's second election and his inauguration. In this brief moment of opportunity he's faced with a crucial decision. Should he end this bloody war, one of the most costly, bitter and divisive in modern history, by a compromising peace with the Confederate enemy?

Colourfully played by James Spader, John Hawkes and Tim Blake Nelson, they're cynical idealists, getting people to change their minds by bribery, blackmail and coercion. Director Steven Spielberg and screenwriter Tony Kushner.

Lincoln is a biographical war drama movie that is based on events during the life of the 16th president of the United States , Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln tells about President Abraham Lincoln during January , in his efforts to pass the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in the United States House of Representatives, which would finally ban slavery in the country. Expecting the Civil War to end within a month but concerned that his Emancipation Proclamation may be rejected by the courts once the war has stopped and the 13th Amendment defeated by the returning slave states. President Lincoln seeks help from his cabinet including the founder of the Republican Party Francis Preston Blair who can help congress vote yes on stopping slavery. Seward about the problem of Democrats. Grant received a surrender from Confederate General Robert E.

Abraham Lincoln's second term, with its momentous choices, has been brought to the screen by Steven Spielberg as a fascinatingly theatrical contest of rhetoric and strategy. It is a nest of high politics for the white ruling class, far from the brutality and chaos of the battlefield. At its centre is a gaunt Shakespearian figure, somewhere between Caesar and Prospero. Spielberg has made a moving and honourably high-minded film about this world-changing moment of American history, his best for many years: I can't imagine anyone not wanting to see it, and to experience the pleasures of something acted with such intelligence and depth. There is admittedly sometimes a hint of hokum; how you react to the film may depend on how you take the opening sequence in which Lincoln , seated like the famous statue but with an easy smile, listens to two black soldiers telling him how they see the war — a slightly Sorkinian scene that ends with one reciting the Gettysburg address while walking away from the president. It is a flight of fancy, not strictly plausible, but very effective in establishing a mood music that swells progressively throughout the picture. Lincoln exerted a grip on me; it is literate, cerebral, heartfelt, with some brilliantly managed moments and, of course, a unique central performance from Daniel Day-Lewis. He portrays Lincoln as a devastating master of charm and exquisite manners, skilled in imposing his authority with a genial anecdote, a man with the natural leader's trick of making people want to please him. He speaks in an unexpectedly light, clear voice that is nonetheless shading off into the maundering monologue of an old man, exhausted by war and personal catastrophes.

Lincoln movie summary

Daniel Day-Lewis delivers an unimpeachable performance in Steven Spielberg's shrewd, stately and somewhat stuffy drama focused on a narrow yet defining chapter of Abraham Lincoln's life: abolishing slavery via the passage of a Constitutional amendment. By Peter Debruge. Chief Film Critic. This is politics as it is really played, yet few writers have found a way to make it as compelling as Kushner does here. Despite occasional digressions into spectacular but artificial-looking Civil War battlefields, the action is rowdiest on the floor of Congress, where Republican representative Thaddeus Stevens Tommy Lee Jones trades scathing barbs with such ideological rivals as George Pendleton Peter McRobbie, who more closely resembles frown-creased portraits of the real-life Stevens than Jones does. Even more effective is the way Kushner integrates the full text of the Gettysburg Address and the 13th Amendment into the body of the film. Such crushing grief falls instead to Field, whose long-suffering Mary endured debilitating migraines and deep depression after the death of their son Willie, but also scandalously overspent in her efforts to outfit the White House — and herself — to a level she felt befitting the first family. Though incongruous with the psychological realism that Kushner, through elevated dialogue, aims to achieve, this iconic style suits such a beloved persona. Home Film Reviews. Nov 1, pm PT.

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Decent Essays. Retrieved February 25, This article is more than 11 years old. Meanwhile, Lincoln also deals with his oft supportive but oft tumultuous relationship with wife Mary Todd Lincoln, and their latest possible rift in oldest son, Robert Todd Lincoln's want to leave law school to enlist. Lincoln — review. Many of the combatants are black. Essay Checker. American Film Institute. Steven Spielberg Kathleen Kennedy. Retrieved November 23, British Board of Film Classification.

The movie showcases his childhood, political career, and personal life. Overall, Lincoln is a must-see movie that accurately portrays history and keeps the audience engaged throughout. As a practical and down-to-earth man from Kentucky.

Retrieved December 18, This is followed by a brief concluding flashback to Lincoln's second inaugural address a month earlier, with its cautious message of hope and realism. Lincoln Assignment Essay. Beyond this he must reassure his generals that the war will be prosecuted with full intensity, and he must deal with his family. Retrieved June 28, December 13, If anything, he lost popularity by working to abolish the slaves. As a result, the peace negotiations fail, and the war continues. At a critical moment in the debate in the House of Representatives, racial-equality advocate Thaddeus Stevens agrees to moderate his position and argue that the amendment represents only legal equality, not a declaration of actual equality. Retrieved April 15, Therefore, in return for his support, Blair insists that Lincoln allow him to engage the Confederate government in peace negotiations. Retrieved November 9, That's how the game is played, and indeed we may be reminded of the arm-bending used to pass the civil rights legislation by Lyndon B. Johnson, the subject of another biography by Goodwin. History News Network.