Barnes & Noble

With one of the 20th century’s most colorful characters as his subject, director Martin Scorsese has turned out an unusually compelling biography that, like many of its kind, generates tremendous interest while ignoring or distorting portions of the historical record. Scorsese’s portrait of maverick tycoon/filmmaker/aviator Howard Hughes (played convincingly by a seemingly miscast Leonardo DiCaprio) is accurate in a “big picture” sense, even to its unstated but strongly implied attribution of Hughes’s legendary eccentricities to an undiagnosed case of what we know today as obsessive-compulsive disorder. And it certainly presents thrilling re-creations of his aerial adventures, which included setting a new airspeed record in 1935, crashing an experimental spy plane in 1946, and getting his mammoth flying boat -- derisively nicknamed “the Spruce Goose” -- airborne in 1947. But the film plays fast and loose with many other aspects of Hughes’s amazing life; for example, it completely ignores his ill-fated first marriage, which was well underway during the three-year production of Hell’s Angels dramatized in Aviator’s first act. It also disregards his torrid affair with then-famous actress Billie Dove and overlooks his lengthy, close friendship with actor Cary Grant. Still, Scorsese does a magnificent job of depicting the wild-and-woolly Hollywood of the late silent and early sound years, vividly recreating the bacchanalian atmosphere of such famous nightspots as the Coconut Grove. Hughes’s lengthy and improbable romance with Katharine Hepburn (Cate Blanchett in an Oscar-winning performance) gets expansive treatment, as does his on-again, off-again fling with glamorous Ava Gardner (Kate Beckinsale). Critics and viewers caught up in the Hollywood sections of the film were less impressed with its last hour, in which a clearly disturbed Hughes, his mental illness exacerbated by head injuries sustained in the 1946 crash, fights for both his sanity and his business. But the tycoon’s memorable showdown with Senator Owen Brewster (Alan Alda), the culmination of Senate hearings called to investigate mismanagement of government funds by Hughes Aircraft during World War II, is a bravura climax that showcases The Aviator’s exceptional writing, directing, acting, and editing. Nearly three hours in length, the film has a few tedious stretches, but Scorsese achieves the heights he's aiming for -- a truly soaring cinematic experience. Ed Hulse

All Movie Guide

Martin Scorsese directed this fast-moving, epic-scale biopic documenting the life and loves one of the most colorful Americans of the 20th century, Howard Hughes. The Aviator follows Hughes (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) as the twentysomething millionaire, having already made a fortune improving the design of oil-drilling bits, comes to Hollywood with an interest in getting into the picture business. It doesn't take long for Hughes, with his passion for airplanes, to jump from producer to director of his first major film project, a World War I air epic called Hell's Angels, which took three years to complete thanks to the shift from silent to sound filming and Hughes' relentless perfectionism. However, the film was a massive hit, and the eccentric inventor became a mogul in Hollywood, making Jean Harlow (Gwen Stefani) a star and enjoying a romance with Katharine Hepburn (Cate Blanchett). But Hollywood's old-boy network never fully accepted Hughes, and in time his passion for flying began to reclaim his attentions as he began designing new planes, setting air speed records, flying around the world, and risking his life testing aircraft. Hughes also found time to romance Ava Gardner (Kate Beckinsale) and founded his own airline, Trans-World Airlines, though as his ideas became bolder, his approach became more eccentric, and he gained many powerful enemies, including the head of Pan-American Airlines, Juan Trippe (Alec Baldwin), and Senator Ralph Owen Brewster (Alan Alda), who attempted to prove that Hughes' radical design ideas were actually part of an effort to bilk taxpayers for millions of dollars through government contracts. The Aviator's star-studded cast also includes John C. Reilly, Jude Law, Willem Dafoe, Ian Holm, and Frances Conroy. Mark Deming

Product Details

• UPC: 085393893927
• Source: WARNER HOME VIDEO
• Region Code: 1
• Presentation: Wide Screen
• Sound: Dolby AC-3 Surround Sound
• Editions: Subtitled, Dubbed
• Time: 2:50:00
• Sales Rank: 7,394

This DVD is also available as part of a box set:

• Scorsese Collection

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