Finally saw Lincoln.
Jun. 3rd, 2013 03:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
icarusFinally saw Lincoln.
My dad panned it.
I planned to like it, just because he didn't.
Alas, I have not managed to like this movie.
Here's what I wrote to dad:
What a dreadful, overblown, pompous, self-conscious piece of drivel that was.
Love the period feel, the camera work, the costumes, the keyhole into Civil War-era Congress.
James Spader: marvelous.
Daniel Day-Lewis: the embodiment of Lincoln.
This is not a good movie. This is a bad movie dignified by great performances. And the smart move of scheduling it during an election year, near the election, with a black man running, a Republican party clinging to anything to buff its party's image -- at a time when no one would dare say one syllable against anything labeled "Lincoln."
It opens with improbability. Slaves who talk like college boys. Soldiers who've memorized the Gettysburg Address as if it were already something you had to memorize for school. We're supposed to feel moved. I rolled my eyes so hard I risked popping a contact lens.
The film improves after this inauspicious opening solely because it set such a low bar. It was enjoyable to see Lincoln finagling. It was an interesting fly-on-the-wall tale.
Then periodically the whole thing would screech to a halt for some dull exposition to tell us how important it all is. Yes, kids, this is real, tru fax history here! Historic history! That's historic!
I want to see a parody where the actors stop to address the camera directly, a la Tom Jones, because they basically did. The dramatic tension would cease, the music would rev up as the plot stalled for everyone to mug at the camera.
It was a relief every time Spader turned up, because his scenes guaranteed the plot would lurch forward again. (I was once on a train in India like this....) Daniel Day-Lewis deserves awe because only his acting salvaged the stiff, ponderous, self-indulgent script.
Time wasted in exposition prevented any real character development of the people who fought for and against the 13th Amendment, reducing them to caricature. Unfortunately, the arm-twisting and their strange mixed motives comprised the actual story line. At the end, I didn't know these people, or care who voted yea or nay, and, as I did kinda know how the vote would go, there was nothing to care about. I started playing Castleville.
And then came the galloping shambles of the, yes, dad, you're right, endings (plural) of the story. But at the time I was building a cathedral in Castleville, the game required me to put a river where I didn't want one to go, and I needed five more planks to rebuild grandma's house. No doubt one or another of those endings was riveting.
I bet the book's great.
My dad panned it.
I planned to like it, just because he didn't.
Alas, I have not managed to like this movie.
Here's what I wrote to dad:
What a dreadful, overblown, pompous, self-conscious piece of drivel that was.
Love the period feel, the camera work, the costumes, the keyhole into Civil War-era Congress.
James Spader: marvelous.
Daniel Day-Lewis: the embodiment of Lincoln.
This is not a good movie. This is a bad movie dignified by great performances. And the smart move of scheduling it during an election year, near the election, with a black man running, a Republican party clinging to anything to buff its party's image -- at a time when no one would dare say one syllable against anything labeled "Lincoln."
It opens with improbability. Slaves who talk like college boys. Soldiers who've memorized the Gettysburg Address as if it were already something you had to memorize for school. We're supposed to feel moved. I rolled my eyes so hard I risked popping a contact lens.
The film improves after this inauspicious opening solely because it set such a low bar. It was enjoyable to see Lincoln finagling. It was an interesting fly-on-the-wall tale.
Then periodically the whole thing would screech to a halt for some dull exposition to tell us how important it all is. Yes, kids, this is real, tru fax history here! Historic history! That's historic!
I want to see a parody where the actors stop to address the camera directly, a la Tom Jones, because they basically did. The dramatic tension would cease, the music would rev up as the plot stalled for everyone to mug at the camera.
It was a relief every time Spader turned up, because his scenes guaranteed the plot would lurch forward again. (I was once on a train in India like this....) Daniel Day-Lewis deserves awe because only his acting salvaged the stiff, ponderous, self-indulgent script.
Time wasted in exposition prevented any real character development of the people who fought for and against the 13th Amendment, reducing them to caricature. Unfortunately, the arm-twisting and their strange mixed motives comprised the actual story line. At the end, I didn't know these people, or care who voted yea or nay, and, as I did kinda know how the vote would go, there was nothing to care about. I started playing Castleville.
And then came the galloping shambles of the, yes, dad, you're right, endings (plural) of the story. But at the time I was building a cathedral in Castleville, the game required me to put a river where I didn't want one to go, and I needed five more planks to rebuild grandma's house. No doubt one or another of those endings was riveting.
I bet the book's great.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-03 10:36 pm (UTC)I'll still probably see it someday simply because the cast is awesome and I've seen pretty much everything Tommy Lee Jones has ever touched with even a cameo, but damn it, I was hoping this would be a little less "Look at me I'm Steven Spielberg and this is HISTORICAL HISTORY that I, personally, brought to you WITH HISTORICAL ACCURACY AND HISTORY" and a little more, "this is Lincoln's story as put together from various biographies and journals and oh by the way, the acting is monumental."
no subject
Date: 2013-06-04 02:31 am (UTC)Tommy Lee Jones delights the ear in this film as always. He's one of the few characters to sneak past the bombast. But there was never any question how he'd vote.