Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio. Cate Blanchett, Kate Beckinsale
Director: Martin Scorsese
Rated: M15+
THE Aviator is a Hollywood epic about one of the United States’ leading capitalist giants who led a glamorous life before mental illness got the better of him and he lived and died an eccentric recluse.
For those who know of Howard Hughes only through his final years, this film may prove a very interesting surprise.
It is really a tribute to him, an acknowledgment of his achievement in the field of aviation, an acknowledgment of his eccentric achievement in movies. It is also an affectionate tribute to him.
Martin Scorsese’s direction enhances John Logan’s very sympathetic screenplay, giving something of a glow, especially to the 1920s and 1930s when Hughes was a hero and a glamorous playboy as well.
The lighting for the 1940s approaches the light of day as Hughes’s story has to face harsher realities.
Hughes was also known as a womaniser, especially with Hollywood film stars.
This is all in the film – although again he appears as less of a predator with expectations that women will fall for him (they generally do) but a more gentle man who is hurt by rejection.
Leonardo DiCaprio proves again what a talented actor he is (think This Boy’s Life, Gilbert Grape, Romeo and Juliet) playing Hughes both younger and older than DiCaprio is.
There are many fascinating sections of The Aviator.
The years of filming his World War I movie, Hell’s Angels, the clash with the Motion Picture Board because of Jane Russell’s famous cleavage in The Outlaw; the design of his planes and his testing them as well as his breaking flying records, the establishing of Trans World Airways (TWA) and his rivalry with Pan Am boss Juan Trippe (Alec Baldwin), the design of the Hercules, his two spectacular crashes and his injuries; the 1947 Senate hearings to defend his good name against the allegations of Senator Brewster (Alan Alda); and the glimpses of Hughes’s fastidiousness, growing obsession with cleanliness, culminating in a powerful sequence of his seclusion.
This is the stuff of good drama.
The Hollywood side is taken care of with his visits to the Coconut Grove, his years with Katharine Hepburn (who was exhilarated by his flying), relationships with the young starlet Faith Domergue and with Ava Gardner.
Cate Blanchett gives an eerie and fascinating impersonation of Katharine Hepburn, mannerisms and all. The sequence where Hughes meets her family and they talk down to him is nervy.
Kate Beckinsale is Ava Gardner but does not give any impersonation of her at all, which is very disappointing and just makes her an independent spirit who is kind to Hughes.
Almost three hours in length, audiences might be dipping in and out of The Aviator, depending on their main interests in Hughes, his life and career.
