Books2Movies Club discussion

On this day, 14th April 1865, Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of United States of America, was mortally wounded by a close-range shot of John Wilkes Booth. That assassination occurred only five days after the end of the American Civil War (I currently read a book that will familiarize me more with the whole thing, I hope - Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era). But what brings me here, are the most interesting movie adaptations of books related to Abraham Lincoln.

The tv series about the Civil War, but mostly fictionalized family saga, North and South (1985) with Patrick Swayze and many other famous actors, is made from John Jakes’s North and South.

Sam Waterston depicted Abraham Lincoln many times, the most prominent time was in a tv series Lincoln (1988) made by Gore Vidal’s non-fiction book Lincoln.

Not based on the book, Robert Redford’s The Conspirator (2010) with James McAvoy and Robin Wright in main roles, is an interesting one, because it depicts a trial against Mary Surratt (view spoiler)[a lady “convicted of taking part in the conspiracy to assassinate Abraham Lincoln…becoming the first woman executed by the United States federal government.” (I am not sure should the history lesson actually be considered as a spoiler, but let it be, for the sake of that movie) (hide spoiler)].


Steven Spielberg bought the rights to Doris Kearns Goodwin’s biography, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln and intends to release the movie, Lincoln, at the end of the year 2012, featuring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Daniel Day-Lewis and Tommy Lee Jones in it. Certainly Oscar-worthy.

On this day, 14th April 1935, Loretta Lynn is born. The famous country-western musician, wrote the autobiography, Loretta Lynn: Coal Miner's Daughter, in 1978. It was quickly made into the famous movie, Coal Miner's Daughter (1980).
It won many awards, among them an Oscar and a Golden Globe for Sissy Spacek in the role of Loretta Lynn, and Golden Globe nominations for Tommy Lee Jones and Beverly D'Angelo.