drjgardner
There are so many good films and documentaries about Lincoln one has to wonder what would you produce another one? For producer-director Vikran Jayanti the reason appears to give us more insight into Lincoln's internal life and to provide some more details about his early life. You probably know Jayanti from his well-regarded "Game Over: Kasparov and the Machine" (2003).The documentary (aka "movie") is 2+ hours long and it covers a good portion of Lincoln's life, from his earliest years with his father through the romances, adventures, and jobs he held. A lot of the material comes from Lincoln's correspondence and there are many photos I haven't here-to-fore seen. Jayanti often visits the geographic areas and tries to reconstruct what life must have looked like at the time. He's pretty successful.The talking heads talk about Lincoln's suicidal ideation, his tendency toward depression, his heterosexual behavior, etc. It's fairly interesting and rarely touched upon by others, although, quite frankly, most of the comments are from B or C team "experts" and about the only A team player is Gore Vidal.For a film that spends a lot of time talking about Lincoln's inner life and his psychological functioning, there are no Psychologists or Psychiatrists among the talking heads, which is clearly a limitation. The film also moves in and out, from 1855 to 1830 to 1840 to whenever, with no seeming rhyme or reason. That's a little distracting and the film clearly needs better editing. All things considered the film is an excellent first draft of a film that might be extremely valuable with a few more authoritative talking heads and some better editing.
