Can't mix Buffy with politics

Rating: 4/10 (16 October 2014)

I actually saw Steven Spielberg's LINCOLN before I saw this one, and in retrospect I wish I'd done things the other way around. The Spielberg film was was skillfully acted and directed, especially with Daniel Day-Lewis in the title role, even if it got bogged down too much in the politics of the 1860s at the expense of focusing on Abraham Lincoln the man. But ABRAHAM LINCOLN VAMPIRE HUNTER ultimately falls short because it tries to do two different things and fails at both of them.
I can't complain about the film's technical aspects, which are about as good as Hollywood gets. And the performances of Benjamin Walker and Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Abe and his wife Mary Todd, respectively, are appealing, even if they're hardly historically accurate even without the vampire stuff. But the central premise of the movie is flawed, at least if you serve it straight-up.
I admit I did not read Seth Graham-Smith's book, which I've heard is superior to the film adaptation. Maybe it's unfair of me to judge one medium by another. But the filmmakers missed a huge opportunity to make ABRAHAM LINCOLN VAMPIRE HUNTER truly entertaining by trying - among other things - to make it a "serious" vampire story. I know one shouldn't always be prejudiced by the title of something, but a movie with a title like this one makes you expect an extra-large helping of horror-camp, like the original BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER movie or Quentin Tarantino's FROM DUSK TILL DAWN (both of which are enjoyable films, even if they're not excellent ones). But here everything is played (no pun intended) deadly seriously and with very little humor. You have to imagine that Honest Abe, who loved telling funny stories, would himself be disappointed.
But all the earnestness doesn't simply make the film boring and depressing; it ruins any chance the story might have had of resonating with audiences. It sucks (again, no pun) all the fun out of vampires by trying to link them to the Confederate States of America. ("Hey, vampires are evil and slavery is evil, so they must be linked somehow, right?") And having the real-life death of Abe's son Will be the result of a vampire disguised as a servant biting the boy would be monstrously insensitive if it weren't so thoroughly absurd. I can't imagine Mary Todd screaming accusations at Abe about their boy being killed in such a way; I'd much rather expect her to just get angry at the VAMPIRES and set about gathering up crucifixes and whittling stakes.
There's one other major problem I just couldn't come to terms with: the idea that the Battle of Gettysburg was actually a fight against vampires in Confederate uniforms, and that the Union soldiers destroyed them by shooting them with silver bullets and goring them with silver bayonet points. Assuming you even try to accept this at face value, how in God's name did it manage to stay out of the history books? After all, the secret of Gettysburg would have been known to Abe, Mary, the entire Lincoln Cabinet, EVERYONE in the War Department, top military leadership, and all the thousands of men who fought and survived. Even if Abe himself wanted to keep it all under wraps, surely SOMEONE would have blabbed.
See ABRAHAM LINCOLN VAMPIRE HUNTER for the novelty value only. There is really no reason to watch it a second time.