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There are almost too many great supporting players in juicy, tantalizingly small parts. You'd love to see more from all of them, including Lee Pace as a grandstanding Democrat railing against the amendment on the House of Representatives floor, Michael Stuhlbarg as a conflicted congressman, Hal Holbrook as the powerful Lincoln ally Preston Blair and Jackie Earle Haley as the vice president of the Confederacy. And then there are James Spader, John Hawkes and Tim Blake Nelson as the cynical, glad-handing trio hired to lobby the toughest Democrats and secure those final, crucial votes; their banter is a consistent source of laughs. It gets to the point where major figures in Lincoln's life -- Sally Field as his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt as his elder son who's eager to see combat
-- don't register as powerfully as they should because the script is just so packed. And that effort to contain so much history in one feature film especially extends to the ending. This is no spoiler
-- we all know what happened to Lincoln -- but there's a beautifully photographed moment that occurs before his assassination that would have left the film on the most perfectly lovely, poignant note. Instead, it keeps going -- and becomes the movie you might have feared "Lincoln" would be. "Lincoln," from DreamWorks Pictures and 20th Century Fox, is rated PG-13 for an intense scene of war violence, some images of carnage and brief strong language. Running time: 150 minutes. Three stars out of four. ___ Motion Picture Association of America rating definition for PG-13: Some material may be inappropriate for young children.
[Associated
Press;
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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