Scorsese, please stick with film restoration

Rating: 3/10 (1 September 2005)

How far the great masters of cinema can fall. THE AVIATOR is a spectacularly bad film with a mere handful of terrific moments.
It has been many years since I have seen a major Hollywood A-picture so filled with grotesque continuity gaffs. I am still scratching my head over how the stellar duo of Scorsese and Thelma Schoonmaker (perhaps one of the greatest living film editors) could have allowed such a sloppy film to go out like it did. Was the bulk of it farmed out to a team of cutters working on PowerBooks with 12" screens, so they couldn't really make out the detail in the Panavision frame? There are an astonishing number of severe goofs, from characters facing the wrong direction after cuts to hats on heads where they weren't worn in the previous cut to overlapping dialogue which starts on closed mouths, etc. Period detail ranges from very close to completely forgotten (costumes, hair and makeup are often strictly contemporary). Attempts to replicate the "look" of 2-strip, and then 3-strip Technicolor are cute but highly inaccurate, and in the case of the 3-strip sections, utterly distracting.
But the problems aren't limited to technical errors. Everyone is miscast. DiCaprio couldn't be more inappropriate as the middle-aged Hughes. Cate Blanchett turns in a very moving performance, but barely echoes Katherine Hepburn. Alan Alda plays... well... Alan Alda competently enough, but is a total one-note. Only Alec Baldwin, as a restrained Pan Am executive, pulls it off. And I won't even mention Kate Beckinsale's non-take on Ava Gardner.
Perhaps the most appalling aspect to the whole mess is the reliance on CGI digital effects for the bulk of the action sequences. What is the difference between THE AVIATOR and a video game? Answer: none. How could Scorsese "honor" the pioneering action direction of Hughes on HELL'S ANGELS by replacing it with completely soulless, one-dimensional computer-driven animation? The mind reels.
This is a very, very bad film.