Big mistake sadly destroys the experience

Rating: 6/10 (9 February 2013)

Let's be frank. If a high school student in a theater class were asked to write a play about Lincoln and his involvement in the North & South conflict that lead to the civil war. Wouldn't that student get scolded for not knowing which states were against slavery and which ones weren't? It's the kind of amateur mistake you don't expect to run across in a Steven Spielberg movie - and so it kind of ruined the rest of the story for me, as I was expecting other blunders to occur along the way.
Apart from this, the movie captures a great deal of accurate details, picturesque scenes and episodes from that time line. The acting was quite good. Technically it could have been much better if the scenes weren't cut from so many different angles and close ups. It seems as though an attempt was made to speed up the dialogs through excessive cutting to accommodate the younger generation of hyperactive spectators. It's not a bad movie but in light of the big factual mistake I'd give it a merciful B-