With nearly $65 million in domestic box office sales, it is clear that director Steven Spielberg’s film Lincoln, a depiction of President Abraham Lincoln and his fight to pass the 13th Amendment, has garnered a tremendous amount of attention and acclaim from American viewers.

For the average movie-goer, the film serves as an opportunity to nestle into a cushioned seat, dive wrist-deep into a bucket of popcorn, and enjoy two and a half hours of evening entertainment– maybe even learning a thing or two about the United States’ 16th president in the process.

But how does Lincoln stack up for a renowned Civil War expert?

Prof. Allen Guelzo, a Gettysburg College professor of the Civil War era and author of Fateful Lightning: A New History of the Civil War and Reconstruction, recently attended the popular film and provided his review for The Daily Beast.

“Cumbersome and over-complicated as it is, Lincoln is still filled with a certain robust joy in the rough-and-tumble of American politics,” said Guelzo of the film. “In an age when so many people puffingly complain about gridlock, lobbying, campaign money, and inefficiency, Lincoln embraces all of them, and good comes out of it. It is, despite its over-length, a movie of confidence – confidence in politics, confidence in a very skilled yet principled politician, confidence in the self-created mazes of our representative democracy.”

Read Guelzo’s full review.

Guelzo has also contributed to several other publications that have covered the film, including articles in the Huffington Post, Patriot-News, and The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Founded in 1832, Gettysburg College is a highly selective four-year residential college of liberal arts and sciences with a strong academic tradition. Alumni include Rhodes Scholars, a Nobel laureate, and other distinguished scholars. The college enrolls 2,600 undergraduate students and is located on a 200-acre campus adjacent to the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania.¿

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