The Better Angels

Set in the Indiana wilderness around 1817, The Better Angels follows Abraham Lincoln's early childhood in a remote log cabin. The boy, thoughtful and quiet, grows up beside a mother he adores while his stern father teaches him to work the land. Illness takes his mother, and his father later returns with a new wife from Kentucky, a woman who recognises the child's intelligence and encourages his education. The film traces the hardship, loss and the two women who shaped the future president during a roughly three-year span of his boyhood.

A.J. Edwards directed and wrote the drama, which was produced by Terrence Malick, Nicolas Gonda and Charley Beil. It was Edwards's first feature as director; his second, First Love, followed in 2022. The cast includes Braydon Denney as the young Abraham, Brit Marling as Nancy Lincoln, Jason Clarke as Tom Lincoln, Diane Kruger as Sarah Lincoln and Wes Bentley, with 32 credited performers in all.

Released in January 2014 and running 95 minutes, the film drew modest audience scores, sitting at 6/10 on IMDb from around 1,500 votes and 6.3/10 on TMDB from a much smaller sample of 47. A critics' rating of 5.8/10 from 48 reviews places it near, though slightly below, the audience scores on IMDb.