A seasoned and sardonic Industry Guy who agrees with my 11.15 review of Lincoln has written the following: “You get so much guff for being tough on Steven Spielberg that I thought you should know this time, with your Lincoln review, you’ve mysteriously pulled your punches.

“And there’s a lot to punch. AO Scott and Kenny Turan seem to be so dazzled by the names on this project that they’re looking past the film’s giant weaknesses, especially Tony Kushner‘s script. For every human expression there are (at least) a hundred lines of history lesson dialogue. The ratio of stock characters to compelling ones is worse.

“Daniel Day Lewis is brilliant, so I’m dazzled too on that count. But he’s in another dimension. It’s like Marlon Brando in a Disney afterschool special. People need to watch Advise and Consent to see how the making of laws can be handled dramatically. Preminger did it, because he had a POV about people. SS and Kushner appear to have none. So you get a movie about laws, and not people. Deadly mistake.

“Oscar for DDL? Sure why not. He delivered.”