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Daniel Day-Lewis characteristically delivers in this witty, dignified portrait that immerses the audience in its world and entertains even as it informs.
All Critics (274) | Top Critics (53) | Fresh (244) | Rotten (30) | DVD (4)
It's very good, but that's not the point. It's necessary. Jun 14, 2013 | Full Review…
It's very good, but that's not the point. It's necessary.
David Thomson
[Spielberg is] a man on a mission. And his not so secret weapon is Day-Lewis, an actor so charismatic it's hard to think clearly while he's on screen. Jan 25, 2013 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review…
[Spielberg is] a man on a mission. And his not so secret weapon is Day-Lewis, an actor so charismatic it's hard to think clearly while he's on screen.
Charlotte O'Sullivan
A rousing, rigorous and morally complex legal procedural more than a trad biopic. And all the better for it. Jan 24, 2013 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review…
A rousing, rigorous and morally complex legal procedural more than a trad biopic. And all the better for it.
Vadim Rizov
What a feat from Day-Lewis: the nearest thing a 21st-century biopic can get to a seance. Jan 24, 2013 | Rating: 5/5 | Full Review…
What a feat from Day-Lewis: the nearest thing a 21st-century biopic can get to a seance.
Peter Bradshaw
'Lincoln' works as a snapshot of a great man without ever slipping into a portrait of sainthood. Jan 22, 2013 | Rating: 4/5 | Full Review…
'Lincoln' works as a snapshot of a great man without ever slipping into a portrait of sainthood.
Dave Calhoun
This is movie magic -- history coming to life, before our eyes. Jan 8, 2013 | Rating: 3.5/4
This is movie magic -- history coming to life, before our eyes.
Moira MacDonald
Lincoln's flaws don't keep it from succeeding on several levels: as a showcase for Daniel Day-Lewis; and as an uncomfortable and pointed reminder about the hideous racism that's an unavoidable piece of America's makeup. Feb 26, 2019 | Full Review…
Lincoln's flaws don't keep it from succeeding on several levels: as a showcase for Daniel Day-Lewis; and as an uncomfortable and pointed reminder about the hideous racism that's an unavoidable piece of America's makeup.
Molly Templeton
Lincoln works as well as it does because the Abraham Lincoln biopic chooses to focus on the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment. Feb 18, 2019 | Rating: 5/5 | Full Review…
Lincoln works as well as it does because the Abraham Lincoln biopic chooses to focus on the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment.
Danielle Solzman
A surprisingly low-key character piece -- which is all the better for it's subtlety. Feb 7, 2019 | Rating: 4/5 | Full Review…
A surprisingly low-key character piece -- which is all the better for it's subtlety.
Daniel Green
Lincoln is a revealing window of the backroom political deals that go into the process of the abolition of slavery and uniting of the nation, as well as Lincoln's own personal relationships with his family. Jan 25, 2019 | Full Review…
Lincoln is a revealing window of the backroom political deals that go into the process of the abolition of slavery and uniting of the nation, as well as Lincoln's own personal relationships with his family.
Nathalia Aryani
It's a platitudinous political drama about how the House of Representatives passed Lincoln's baby, the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which outlawed slavery. Dec 19, 2018 | Rating: 2/4 | Full Review…
It's a platitudinous political drama about how the House of Representatives passed Lincoln's baby, the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which outlawed slavery.
Kelly Jane Torrance
Lincoln remains an honorable movie compounded of irresolute but mostly upright intentions; and its strengths are only a little undercut by the synthetic quality of its ambition. Nov 15, 2018 | Full Review…
Lincoln remains an honorable movie compounded of irresolute but mostly upright intentions; and its strengths are only a little undercut by the synthetic quality of its ambition.
David Bromwich
This pathetic melodrama is always more interesting when focusing on the politics involved but a very schmaltzy "life lesson" whenever Lincoln appears - shown as a wise and mythical storyteller of pure heart (but fine with bribing, of course), never a complex real man.
Super Reviewer
Spielberg updates Triumph of the Will for a liberal American agenda; and that's what's wrong with this overview on the efforts to free the American slaves constitutionally. It's unfortunately heavyhanded, more propaganda than cinema. Still, it's a story that needed telling, and right now it's the only game in town. So. It ain't terrible.
Spielberg and Day-Lewis are masterful in "Lincoln". The material is rife with C-SPAN-like moments rendered quite compelling due to their execution. The plot, while based on a quite complex historical situation, is told simply and efficiently. It is this efficiency that threatens to blunt the film's impact as it sacrifices emotion for historical accuracy. But the high point for "Lincoln" is to witness the master class of acting put on by the committed Daniel Day-Lewis. He makes Lincoln a marvel to behold. And his performance makes going back to 1865 worth it.
First off: lots of history here that I didn't know. I didn't understand the legal technicalities of wanting a constitutional amendment to free the slaves; how Lincoln thought that the Emanicipation Proclamation wouldn't hold after peace was declared as the Supreme Court might squash it. I didn't know that Thaddeus Stevens, rep from Pennsylvania (yeaaah, Pennsylvania!) was so cool or that, as I later read, his interest in racial equality was based on the bible: Egyptians kept Jews as slaves and God visited plagues on them, he thought America condoning slavery would keep us from being prosperous--I don't agree with his reasoning, but I admire the end result and his tenacity. Secondly, the willingness of Lincoln to sully himself in the trenches of politics to get to a higher good was astounding and I wish we had a little more of that in our current-Obama-led administration. Politics ain't pretty, Barrack. My one itsy-bitsy criticism is this: Spielberg did a wonderful job of not sentimentalizing Afro-Americans-then-slaves, great scene where is he talking to his wife's maid saying "I don't know any negroes" for example and you get the point that his is a fight about justice, not some rose colored glasses reading of human nature, but John Williams musical accompaniment was treakle: every time the camera lingered on a dark face the violins swelled and I thought it dragged the story into the Hallmark forest. Sally Fields was wonderful as the hysterical Mary Todd Lincoln--their fight over their son's joining the military was brilliant and bone-chilling. And I loved the blue-gray wash of the film.
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