The Aviator is a more refined picture that deviates from director Martin Scorsese’s usually violent subject matter, a change from the usual which has been seen before, however, as in Kundun. Following the violent Gangs of New York, in 2002, Scorsese takes on an ambitious, heavily budgeted epic, with The Aviator, a classy, sumptuous, and intimate biopic of movie mogul and entrepreneurial billionaire Howard Hughes, who was making films and inventing commercial aircraft during the time of the Golden Age of Hollywood.
Qualities and Lack Thereof
There is at least lighter entertainment value in Howard Hughes’s business endeavours in creating world class aviation from his company, TWA and makes for interesting, even compelling cinema.
Cate Blanchett nails it and uncannily gets Katharine Hepburn’s vocal range to a tee – she is astonishing and convincingly expresses Hepburn’s humour and compassion. The movie is obviously enhanced by Scorsese’s knowledge of movie history in which he lovingly labours precision and detail to nostalgic effect. The look of the movie is eye popping. The design and structure cannot be faulted. The Aviator is masterfully made – and a look inside life and mind.
Compassion For The Key Character
Mogul Howard Hughes suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder, it is a complex role for Leonardo DiCaprio, who gets his most demanding role to date, and carries it convincingly.
The ‘what happened in his childhood’ scene is deftly ambiguous and charged, adding a layer of emotional identification with Hughes.
At times, the editing and direction communicate Hughes’s state of mind with up most artistry: note the dinner table scene at the Hepburn estate with its brilliantly edited claustrophobic effect and Hughes during a reclusive episode.
And the pressure put on him by business competitors, in court and out of it, somehow got to him.
Hughes’s female company is of a curious value.
Scorsese conveys that Hughes’s obsession with planes is like his attentiveness to some of his women – they are all curves – particularly Jean Harlow (Gwen Stefani in one scene as Hughes’s date at a movie premiere) and Ava Gardner (Kate Beckinsdale). Katharine Hepburn (Cate Blanchett) is the only character who offers a genuinely open and sympathetic point of view towards Hughes.
Warnings: MPAA Rating: PG-13 (for thematic elements, sexual content, nudity, language and a crash sequence). Director: Martin Scorsese. Screenwriter: John Logan. Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Cate Blanchett, John C. Reilly, Kate Beckinsale, Jude Law, Gwen Stefani, Alec Baldwin, Danny Huston, Ian Holm, Alan Alda, Frances Conroy.
Reviewed by Peter Veugelaers
Later Thoughts
Years on, I happened to see some of the film on television and the profanity was the final straw at that time and changed channel.
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