The Conspirator (***)
Directed by: Robert Redford
Starring: James McAvoy, Robin Wright, Kevin Kline, Danny Huston, Justin Long, Evan Rachel Wood, Toby Kebbell, Tom Wilkinson, Norman Reedus, Alexis Bledel, Johnny Simmons, Stephen Root, Colm Meaney, James Badge Dale
Seen: August 8th 2011
*** Out of ****
In April of 1865, John Wilkes Booth (Kebbell) shot Abraham Lincoln at Ford’s Theatre in Washington D.C., forming part of a conspiracy to induce renewed effort by the Confederate troops in their waning effort in the American Civil War. The plot also included attempts on the lives of Vice President Johnson and Secretary of State Seward, but these failed. Among the conspirators was John Surrat (Simmons), who managed to escape, and as part of the witch-hunt to assuage public fears of the guilty getting away, Mary Surrat (Wright), John’s mother, was arrested and prosecuted as a conspirator to the murder of Lincoln, making him the first American President to be assassinated, and the attempted murders on Johnson and Seward.
US Senator Reverdy Johnson (Wilkinson) believed that Mary Surratt should have a trial, and a fair one if at all possible, but having moved out of his position as attorney general (and possibly out of doubts about the case), he assigned a young attorney to Mary Surrat’s case; Fredrick Aiken (McAvoy), a young war hero who himself has doubts about and objections to defending the conspirator. Opposing counsel Joseph Holt (Huston) was better connected and more influential, and in the progress of the case not only this, but also a fierce and universal tendency to go against the Southern conspirator weighs heavily against Aiken. Even Aiken’s friends Nicholas Baker (Long) and William Hamilton (Dale) are not fully supportive. Aiken tries time and again to incorporate truths and fair practice into his case for the defence as he starts believing Mary Surratt’s claims of innocence, but he is cut off at every turn with a frustrating injustice being paraded as “in the best interest of the nation”. Even Lincoln’s Secretary of War Edwin Stanton (Kline) does all he can to ensure Mary Surratt is punished to the full extent of the law, having even fair and legal and sensible happenings in favour of the defence quickly dampened.
James McAvoy is a great young actor, and he leads up a magnificent performance by the entire cast with Robin Wright, Danny Huston, Kevin Kline, Tom Wilkinson and Evan Rachel Wood (Anna Surratt, Mary’s daughter) all excelling as their respective characters. The Conspirator is a beautifully made period piece, while watching it you are completely immersed in the world director Robert Redford presents. While not everyone will be immune to or fully understanding of the forced slow pace and frustrating injustice depicted, it is more than just any other period piece – well made and well acted. For the historians out there this is a must see, and for the rest of us it depends on how you feel on the day – I was not entirely up to what I got, but I still saw a good movie.
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