Possibly educational?

Rating: 5/10 (6 June 2013)

I don't know about Lincoln, the film. Perhaps it was educational. I did not know that Mr. Lincoln was a philosopher of sorts. I did not know that he tried to have his wife locked up in a loony bin. (Are those two propositions even compatible?)
I also never imagined that a movie about war could be so much about the president sitting around essentially thinking out loud among bureaucrats or family members inside various official and unofficial spaces.
The pace was nearly as slow as Benjamin Button, and the tone and quality seemed much closer to a PBS television special than a feature-length film by a director as great as Spielberg. This is definitely not his best effort--by a long shot. Throughout most of the film I found myself muttering out loud (à la Lincoln himself!) that I felt as though I was watching public television.
I worry that the film overly glorified Lincoln and may have painted his intentions as more noble than they were. What was his real priority? To end slavery? Or to end the war?