Scorsese does "Citizen Kane"

Rating: 10/10 (2 April 2005)

Normally, Martin Scorsese and big-budget epics go together like oil and water. When Scorsese does low-budget, small-scale features like "Who's That Knocking At My Door", "The King of Comedy", "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore", or even the criminally underrated "Bringing Out the Dead", no one can touch him. But with over-slick & too-long fare such as "New York, New York", "The Last Temptation of Christ", "Kundun" & "Gangs of New York", he has always seemed out of his element.
Yet somehow, "The Aviator" works. There are those who say it is only because Scorsese took over from Michael Mann, who knows how to do long films well (i.e. "Heat") & who had experience with big budgets & large-scale productions during his time doing "Miami Vice" in the '80's. But I think the real reason for it is because at some point, either Scorsese or screenwriter John Logan realized that Howard Hughes was a real-life Citizen Kane, and that any movie of his life should be an homage to Orson Welles' masterpiece.
So the first thing they did was hire an actor (Leonardo DiCaprio playing an adult for the first time) who--like Welles in 1941--is only really old enough for the early scenes, and whose boyish face isn't quite suited for the mustache he wears through most of the film. Then they recreated some of the more famous set-pieces, such as the screening room, the party full of dancing girls and sycophants, the burning of his possessions, the use of split-screen for the more important conversations, and the monologue about losing millions of dollars a year. Then they grafted on much of the plot about a multi-millionaire who spends lavishly upon his passions instead of making sound investments, who drives away the women he sleeps with, who is more feared than loved amongst his inner circle, and who has a powerful rival who brings scandal upon our hero.
Of course the match isn't perfect. Hughes' Achilles heel is not hubris or egomania (of which he has plenty), but mental illness. And the last time I checked, there are no jaw-dropping aeronautical stunts in "Kane".
But like "Kane", the movie has only one real flaw. In "Kane", it was the that the ceilings in the newspaper office were too low. In "The Aviator", it's DiCaprio's God-awful attempt at a Texas accent, marring an otherwise brilliant performance.
Ultimately, "The Aviator" should be remembered as one of Scorsese's best movies. It is slightly better than "Goodfellas" (emphasis on *slightly*), but it doesn't reach the rarefied air of Scorsese's holy trinity of "Mean Streets", "Taxi Driver" & "Raging Bull". Nonetheless, it earns 10 stars out of 10.