The weakest element in the film is the script because it created so many questions for me. I would have like to have learned how Hughes Tools grew to such stature to provide for Hughes' every whim. Also, I was never clear about what, if anything, caused his episodes of madness. And if Hughes was so germphobic, how he could be with so many women as the film alludes to? As wonderful as sex is, it can be messy and for someone who had to have his peas laid out on a plate in a certain pattern the two desires appear incongruous, but then again, does madness make any sense to those of us on the outside of it?
The Aviator is an interesting biography set against during interesting time in our country's history. The last scene was fantastic in the way it foreshadowed the madness that Hughes' life would eventually succumb to. It's very simple and very clear in what the future holds for Howard without telling us directly.
While I found the film to be technically marvelous, especially the recreation of Hughes' crashing of the XF-11 in Beverly Hills, a thrilling action sequence because of its realistic effects, I felt a tad empty when it was finished. I didn't feel I had watched a Scorsese picture. Instead, it felt more like the most elaborate episode of an A&E Biography. There was none of his usual touches thematically or technically. The film comes off like just an assignment for him, a job he had to take to show he could deliver a movie so the money people in Hollywood might take another chance on one of his films since Gangs of New York didn't turn out so well. There's no opening credit sequence identifying it was Marty's film, so that might have been a clue right there. It's a very good picture, just not a very good Scorsese picture. I enjoyed watching it, but I don't envision watching it repeatedly like I do many of his other films.
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