When I first heard about this film not long ago, I immediately knew I had to see it. The premise is simply so absurd that it had to be entertaining — or so I thought. Now that I have actually watched it, I am a bit more conflicted about whether I should have done so at all.
The basic idea is obviously completely unhinged, and one cannot help wondering how anyone even comes up with something like this. Bill Oberst Jr. does a genuinely good job in the title role, and I would even say he bears a fairly convincing resemblance to Abraham Lincoln when compared to photographs of the real man.
It also turns out not to be nearly as amateurish a production as I had expected. Naturally, it is no major blockbuster, but I had imagined it would operate on a far lower level than it actually does. I was expecting the “so-bad-it’s-good” factor to flow freely, yet the film is surprisingly restrained in that regard. At the same time, this more serious tone makes the whole thing feel a bit stiff — even somewhat dull at times.
The film earns extra points for incorporating historical figures (aside from Lincoln himself) into the narrative. Whether this is historically consistent everywhere, or whether these individuals even lived during the same period, is not something I know well enough to judge, and I will happily leave that debate to historians. For my purposes, it is simply an entertaining device, and one that amused me.
As a piece of light entertainment, the film works well enough — but it is hardly something that demands a second viewing.
