Redford Presents Lincoln Assassination Conspiracy

September 12th, 2010 (7) Posted By Pat Dollard.

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TORONTO (Reuters) – In his new film “The Conspirator,” director Robert Redford digs into a little-known angle of one of the best-known moments in American history: the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln.

Instead of dealing with the shooting in the Ford’s Theater in Washington, already a movie subject, Redford takes aim at a back story to the 1865 assassination of the U.S. president — a complex plot that resulted in seven men and one woman being arrested and charged with conspiring to kill the president, the vice president, and the secretary of state.

Redford’s independent film centers around that woman, Mary Surratt, played by Robin Wright, and the defense mounted by young lawyer Frederick Aiken, played by James McAvoy.

Surratt owned a boarding house where assassin John Wilkes Booth and others planned the multiple attacks. She was the first woman executed by the U.S. government.

It “is a story that very few, if any, know,” Redford, whose film awards include an Oscar for directing “Ordinary People,” told a news conference ahead of Saturday’s gala screening of “The Conspirator” at the Toronto International Film Festival.

He said he was drawn to the “story that sits inside of a story that everybody knows — the Lincoln assassination.”

The nation wanted justice, and while the young lawyer Aiken realizes his client may be innocent, he understands that she is being used as bait to capture the only conspirator to have escaped a massive manhunt — her own son, John.

Lincoln’s assassination, as the U.S. Civil War was drawing to an end, threw the nation into disarray. Redford said present day America is not much different, in that it is a nation that is deeply divided on its opinions of its president, and of the president that went before.

Speaking on the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, he added: “History is a series of loops. We keep repeating ourselves. Now we’re living in a condition of confusion and anxiety and fear and that was the same thing 150 years ago.”

The period drama’s cast also includes Kevin Kline, Tom Wilkinson, Justin Long, Evan Rachel Wood, and Alexis Bledel. The film arrived at the Toronto festival without a distributor.

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  • Judith, typical White Ohioan

    I bet Booosh did it!

  • Nate Whilk

    I wonder if they’ll bring up the facts that Lincoln was a Republican, the northern Democrats pilloried him and wanted to leave the country split, and all sorts of other inconvenient truths.

    Also, Secretary of War Stanton had decades earlier called Lincoln a “gorilla” and there’s at least one political cartoon that depicts Lincoln as a monkey. Does “Bush is a chimp” sound familiar?

  • RetAF

    Yes, history does keep repeating itself. There are evil people who want to destroy our constitutional republic. We must take whatever legal means are necessary; including military tribunals, which is how the conspirators were tried. Military commissions are still legal, after all.

    There WERE southerners who wanted to keep slavery legal. There WERE communist spies who were trying to destroy America in the 1950s. (That’s how Stalin got the plans to build nuclear weapons). There ARE islamic terrorists who still want to destroy our nation.

    Yet for some reason every time liberals lecture us on American history it’s the good guys they vilify. McCarthy is remembered as a villain, and the term “McCarthyism” is almost as vehement a slur as the term “racism”. But no one today even remembers the name Rosenberg.

  • Jarhead68

    Speaking of McCarthy, M. Stanton Evans authored a book about Joe McCarthy some time in 2009 and I have been meaning to read it but haven’t had the time. It’s supposed to lay bare all the real facts about McCarthy and the House Un-American Activities Committee. McCarthy was not the villain the leftist press has made him out to be, according to Evans’ well-sourced book. Anyone here read it yet?

  • Tyler520

    History doesn’t necessarily repeat itself, but it does tend to rhyme

  • http://askibusts@gmail.com Sarah Surratt

    As a decendant of the Surratt’s I am very upset that Robert Redford made this movie without even contacting any decendants of the Surratt family! I have info that the film research crew contacted the “Surratt Society” (who should be ashamed of themselves for calling themselves that as there are no actual Surratt’s in this society. It’s a newsletter that mAkes $$$$ off of my family’s tradgedy!) for informtion on the conspiricy of the asassination ! However I am wondering why or how was Robert Redford able to get thus info and make this movie without talking to Any decendants of the Surratts! I would like a word with old Rob Redford as he is also banking off of my family’s tragedy!!!! If any one has a link or email to him or production I would like it thanks !! Sincerly , Sarah Surratt

  • http://askibusts@gmail.com Sarah Surratt

    Is it ok and within his rights to make a movie about my family’s tragedy without getting any information or asking permission to any of the decendants of the Surratt line??? Or did he think there were none of us left to even bother? I would like to know if someone makes a movie about your relatives do they need your permission or blessing or can I just make a movie about Robert Redfords family??? Or would I have a lawsuit on my hands???Sincerly, Sarah Surrett – 5th great niece of John Surratt Jr. (Mary Surratt’s son and co-conspirator with John Wilks Booth)