BEFORE: I got lucky again - Frances Conroy carries over from the end of "Scent of a Woman". I don't require that any two successive movies share an actor/actress, but it's nice when they do. (Could you imagine? Jeez, if I had to do it all over...) And we go from a blind angry veteran to an obsessive germophobic pilot, that's the reasoning.
THE PLOT: A biopic depicting the early years of legendary director and aviator Howard Hughes' career, from the late 1920s to the mid-1940s.
AFTER: I really didn't know much about Howard Hughes before watching this - which movies he (over-)produced in the 1930's, that he romanced Kate Hepburn and Ava Gardner, and founded TWA. All I really knew was that he was some kind of rich recluse in the 1950's and 60's. But every film is an opportunity to learn SOMEthing.
Leonardo DiCaprio (last seen in "Catch Me If You Can") is a fine actor, in the right role - but I don't know if this was right for him. Though he was 30 when this film was released, he still had a boyish face and voice - he still looks 16 or 17 to me. Although later on, with the beard and disheveled clothing, he did look a little older, maybe mid-20s, but Hughes was supposed to be in his 40's then.
I would have liked to learn a little more about his condition - was it just fear of germs, or was it O.C.D. (did they even have that back then?) or something else? I watched a reality show last year where they took 7 people with OCD and made them live together and do group therapy - you might think that's a really bad idea, and a bad show concept, but I learned a lot about the condition, and possible treatments. Now me, I have C.D.O. - it's kind of the same, except the letters are in the right order.
But what were Hughes' triggers? Was it the crowds, the flashbulbs, the way his mother taught him to spell while bathing him (weird...)? Was he driven to succeed, afraid of failure? And what made him repeat the same phrases over and over? Can a man be both an aviation-oriented technical genius, and a reclusive nutball? Where is the line between genius and madness?
But I feel for the guy, I really do. I can't tell you how many times I've seen someone on the subway cough or sneeze into their hand, and then put it RIGHT BACK on the pole. Really? Why don't you just cough in everyone's face? Or people in a sandwich or donut shop who wear those little clear gloves, and then think that everything is somehow sterile as they make my sandwich. Well, not if you keep wearing the gloves when you touch a doorknob or answer your phone! Your phone was just right next to your mouth, so now all that's on my sandwich! People just don't get it...
As an afterthought, who were those creepy men approaching Hughes at the end? Honestly, I'm left with more questions than answers - did Scorcese want Howard Hughes to remain some kind of riddle wrapped in an enigma? Or was he just so complex that a movie can't possibly give us much insight to his state of mind? Was there no way in, or did the movie just fail to find it?
Also starring Cate Blanchett (last seen in "The Talented Mr. Ripley"), Kate Beckinsale (last seen in "Underworld: Evolution"), Alec Baldwin (last seen in "The Juror"), John C. Reilly (last seen in "Anger Management"), Ian Holm (last seen in "The Fifth Element"), Alan Alda (last seen in "Flash of Genius"), Danny Huston (last seen in "How to Lose Friends & Alienate People"), Adam Scott (last seen in "Knocked Up"), with cameos from Brent Spiner (last seen in "I Am Sam"), Edward Herrmann (last seen in "The Man with One Red Shoe"), Willem Dafoe (last heard in "Fantastic Mr. Fox"), Jude Law (last seen in "Sherlock Holmes"), Gwen Stefani and Loudon Wainwright III (also last seen in "Knocked Up").
RATING: 5 out of 10 milk bottles
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