Lincoln (5/5 Stars)

Hmmmm….yummy political sausage….nomnom

Movies about the political process are about as rare as movies about marriage. We tend to romanticize politics by only making movies about campaigns, that romantic engagement between candidate and constituency, whose love for each other is consummated on election night right before the credits roll. Then like every romantic comedy that ends with a wedding we are left with the impression that everyone lived happily ever after. Love never faltered and the impassioned promises made in the campaign speeches were borne into reality by magical political storks. Abracadabra. Getting hitched/elected was the hard part and everything after was easy.

“Lincoln” the newest directorial effort from Steven Spielberg, is that incredibly rare movie that is about the actual work of being a politician. In it, our 16^th President, Abraham Lincoln, spearheads an effort to get the 13^th Amendment, which abolished slavery, passed by the required two-thirds vote in the United States House of Representatives. How rare is it for a movie to be about passing a bill in Congress? Well, according to what I’ve rated on Netflix, I have seen 1700 movies. I went through them all to find something similar on this topic. I found almost nothing. There are a few television series that have successfully written about the political process (Aaron Sorkin’s ‘West Wing,’ Armando Ianucci’s “Veep,” David Simon’s “The Wire) but to find a political movie that was not directly concerned with an election, I had to go all the way back to 1939’s “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.” Is it not amazing that whenever filibuster reform is discussed on the 24-hour news networks that they keep bringing up a movie from 1939? We literally do not have a more current movie to draw upon for examples of the political process. All we have is “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” and that short cartoon from schoolhouse rock “I’m Just a Bill.” So when I say that “Lincoln” is the best movie I have ever seen about Democracy, you can take that with a grain of salt. The bar is extremely low.

“Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” is a decent movie and great democratic propaganda for a nation on the edge of an apocalyptic war with fascism and communism, but it still makes the same goddamn mistake that every political movie has made since and in my opinion what has completely gridlocked the legislative branch we currently have. That mistake is the idea that an impassioned speech about principles will somehow convince the other side to change their position. It was bullshit when it worked in the 1939 movie and it is bullshit now. What I love most about “Lincoln” is that it shows politics how it should be done: down and dirty in the mud of power, greed, and nasty compromises.

For this reason and how it is so clearly and efficiently represented, the writer Tony Kushner should win an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay. The job performed is to represent all constituencies that Abraham Lincoln has to appease to in order to pass the Amendment. There is the Conservative Republican led by Preston Blair (Hal Holbrook) who are anti-slavery but prize the preservation of the Union above all else. Lincoln has to promise them that he will take into consideration any peace offer by the Confederates, even if slavery is to remain intact, if it will end the war. Lincoln has to keep this secret though from the Radical Republicans led by the abolitionist firebrand Thaddeus Stevens (Tommy Lee Jones). The radicals are not merely for equality before the law but total racial equality (i.e. going into the south, breaking up plantations and redistributing property amongst the ex-slaves). Lincoln has to temper the positions of this voting block in order to make the idea of a 13^th Amendment palatable to everyone else. But even if Lincoln gets the unanimous support of all the Republicans in Congress he still needs twenty Democrat votes to get past 2/3rds. Practically all these votes are pro-slavery. So Lincoln decides to call upon three “fixers” from Albany (James Spader, John Hawkes, Tim Blake Nelson) to do some bribing. They focus on lame duck congressman who have lost the past election and will be out of a job come the next term. They are offered political posts like postmasters and treasury secretaries in exchange for a “Yes” on the 13^th Amendment. Each voter has his own opinions and motivations. It takes extremely good writing to get everything explained in such a way that is clear, creates suspense, and does not bog down the momentum of the story. It is accomplished and then some with enough room for Kushner to throw in updates from the Civil War and some domestic strife for Lincoln to deal with, i.e. the hysteria of his historically crazy wife Mary Todd (Sally Field) and the wishes of his son Robert (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) to join a war effort that has already cost hundreds of thousands of lives.

This is all rather serious stuff; so much so that one of this movie’s greatest attributes is that it is also consistently funny. The three “fixers” provide a good part of the comedic relief but the main component of humor is Abraham Lincoln himself, played brilliantly by Daniel Day-Lewis. It has often been chronicled that the historical Lincoln was a great joke and storyteller and in this movie we are treated to a retelling of his best material. Have you ever heard of the one about Ethan Allan and the portrait of George Washington in an English outhouse?

The portrayal of Lincoln in this movie does great justice to the man as a politician. Many times I have read about politicians who were great at actually getting things done as opposed to politicians who were just great at making speeches (think LBJ and FDR as opposed to JFK and BHO). One consistent attribute is the ability to making others believe that they are in agreement without any real commitment being made. There are many great examples of that being done in this movie by Lincoln. The trick is to listen thoughtfully and then tell a rather vague yet humorous story. For instance in the beginning of the movie, Lincoln is speaking to a couple of black soldiers. The black soldiers speak of equal pay with white soldiers and having black officers someday. Then they press Lincoln on what will happen to them after the war. “I’m not very good at shining shoes and cutting hair,” one says. Lincoln then makes a self-deprecating joke about how hard it is for anyone to cut his hair. “My last barber committed suicide,” he jokes. Then the conversation is interrupted by a couple of other soldiers and the conversation topic is eluded. Classic Politician. This great technique goes back thousands of years all the way to Jesus. Instead of focusing on the details of current policy that can lead to many minor points of contention, tell a parable vague enough that everyone can agree with it in theory. The fact that Lincoln was able to do this in private and at the same time actually craft a definite specific policy that successfully passed is the essence of his genius. I am of the opinion that it takes genius to aptly portray genius and that is what makes this one of the best movies of the year.  

The Incredible Hulk 06/22/08

It seems to me that the greatest boon we have received from computer generated effects is that it has enabled the regular average joe to become an action star. In the early days of blockbuster, the action flick was populated by Schwarzeneggers, Seagels, and Stallones. Great burly men with more muscle than humanity. Now with the advent of this new technology the likes of Tobey Maguire and Robert Downey Jr. have replaced your average steroid toking action star. Nowhere is this more evident than in 'The Incredible Hulk' a story that by necessity always required a strong man. In fact, the first actor to portray the character, Lou Ferrigno, was noticeably more hulk than brilliant scientist. Now we have the fine actor, Edward Norton, filling the role. This is simply one of those movies that couldn't have been made right twenty years ago. 
It may not have been made right today either for that matter, even though it is still worth the watch. Controversy surrounds this movie as the star Ed Norton is currently in a bit of a tiff with Marvel and refused to do publicity. Apparently there is a fifteen minute longer version of the film that he supported but was shelved because the studio felt it would detract from ticket sales. I have only seen the shorter version but have an inkling that Norton has a right to be angry. There are a couple characters in the beginning that are introduced but have absolutely no development. For instance, the girl in the factory, but especially the psychiatrist boyfriend of Bruce Banner's ex girlfriend played by Liv Tyler. This psychiatrist is basically in two scenes where he does absolutely nothing and then gets dumped so fast (with almost no explanation) by Tyler that I was left wondering why he was in the story at all. I'd be very curious to see those missing fifteen minutes. They probably explain why the first half of this movie was sort of arbitrary and confusing.
The second half of this movie is first rate thankfully and a lot of that has to do with the bad guy, Tim Roth, and the late appearance of a fellow scientist, Mr. Blue. This movie does not make the same mistakes that 'Iron Man' did. It is completely clear why the evil dude is evil and why he wants to do evil things. There is no 'talking villain' syndrome where he has to explain his actions. We get it from the beginning. When he turns into a Hulk copy called 'The Abomination' and starts terrorizing downtown Manhattan, we get our money's worth. The climax of this movie is truly climatic. The final fight scene is superb. 
What's even more important is that the movie left me with a desire to see the next 'Hulk' movie, even though I had no knowledge of the comic or the character before I walked into the theater. With the success of 'Iron Man' and now 'The Incredible Hulk' I believe Marvel has taken two huge steps in the right direction in successfully bringing their entire catalog to the screen. (Thor and Captain America are in the works, as are another Spiderman and Iron Man plus two more X-men movies) Based on these two movies there is much too look forward too.

Syriana 12/11/05

This movie was confusing and half the time I didn't know what was going on. Only at about halfway or whatever through the movie did I get some inkling of something. I wish I had gotten more, I wish this because the subject is so interesting. Wouldn't we all want to know something more about the oil business. But this movie never stops to explain. It shows lots of places, lots of people, lots of situations. There's a story about a corporation merger, a dynastic struggle in an Arab nation, the training of a muslim jihadist, a betrayed CIA agent. I wish for once, they would pause the constant setting switches and have two people sit down and have a long talk about what's going on. But again, this never happens. Instead the characters make small talk, nods, and whispers. And that's the reasons why the movie fails. A movie may have all the materials for success, but if the audience doesn't understand what's going and why, they won't become emotionally involved. At some points in the story, I'm sure what was happening was important, but I didn't know why. I was shut out of the story, and if that's what the writer/director has in mind, then I'm not too impressed. (A shame really, it looked like a good movie)