Spielberg's Lincoln is not a history but the present in form of truth and politics

Rating: 8/10 (7 January 2013)

If you think that Stephen Spielberg's movie Lincoln is a drab and dull biographical sketch of the sixteenth president of the United States then you are making a big mistake! The story line of the movie moves in and around only one-month period of the president's life; and that one month period happens to be the month of January, 1865. Through the reference of Emancipation Proclamation and Gettysburg Address, Spielberg has been able to portray a compelling and powerful figure of the iconic man, Lincoln. The movie vividly depicts the public as well as private struggle for emancipation of serfs. The movie gives a kaleidoscopic view of the person, Lincoln; we really do not need to look at his whole biography to get a vivid idea about the sixteenth president of the United States. Lincoln is a person who took the sole responsibility of saving the United States. He is an idealist who wanted America to be a land free of slaves and serfdom. His opportunism lay in the fact that he built in the quality of playing game called politics in a cool manner so as to accomplish what he dreamt for the Union. Daniel Day-Lewis has acted wonderfully to portray the passion that Abraham Lincoln possessed for America. The alteration of the flow of history made by Lincoln, who outwitted his opponents, has been depicted on screen fabulously. He also tells stories to his supporters to induce the policies of politics in them.
If you really want to know what politics really is, and how good a politician Abraham Lincoln was, then you must go to watch the movie Lincoln. You can consider the policies of politics to be very dirty and horrible, but the tactics adopted by Lincoln in terms of politics has finally forged the necessary coalition among parties in the House of Representatives, that led to the passing and hence enactment of 13th Amendment. The movie all along represents the battle intelligent and opportunist Lincoln has to fight for 13th Amendment. The movie, apart from presenting the politician, presents the man Abraham Lincoln and gives a clear picture of the 1860s government. While watching the movie, audience will surely inhibit the idea that though it is Day-Lewis who is performing Lincoln, Day-Lewis came to the world as a re- incarnation of Abraham Lincoln, only to show people what Lincoln actually did for the emancipation of serfs. Spielberg has returned to his very own form of direction and gave us a fantabulous movie that makes us to sit and ponder and thank Lincoln for what he did to save his Union. Lincoln has been able to eradicate the gap between history and present; what the movie presented is reality, struggle, politics, achievement and death; all are constant factors of life from time immemorial.