Well worth watching; Hughes was a fascinating man, the Steve Jobs of his time.

Rating: 9/10 (6 February 2012)

The movie is lengthy, two hours and fifty minutes; it is however the time needed to cover the Howard Hughes life's highlights, and the time necessary to develop the character, specially the portrayal of his mental illness in the context of the events of his life. He was as important in his time and has contributed much to our modern society. He was a visionary; that aspect is always a topic worth putting on film as it is in books.
Martin Scorsese is known not to hold back; he will research a story in great details and will spare no cost to cover that in the films he makes. He surprised me, in 2004, when he picked Leonardo DiCaprio to play the leading role; the age of his leading man seemed a bit of a stretch, but that was due in part to my misperception, because he looked younger at 30 then, than most of us do. I had that prejudice when I first watched it, but I did anyway and even did a second time when I got the DVD. As many of us purchased big wide screen TVs in recent years, revisiting the movies we have in our collection seems like the thing to do; why bother buying them if not to watch them again. Well, the cinematography is superb and I'm glad I revisited this flick. DiCaprio is an outstanding actor; he has played, in the last decade at least, many excellent characters with all the intensity and credibility one could hope for. I've seen them all and always look forward to the next. In passing, I like that we don't hear about his personal life and that he does not do promo interviews; great actors just don't and that does not distract us from their performances.
The supporting cast, if one can say Cate Blanchett has a supporting role (more like co-star), includes many big names and they all did superbly. Go over that list, you'll see what I mean. I have read many great reviews from other users, as well as some sour ones from people whose taste I question. I cannot recommend this movie strongly enough; I even would suggest it would be pleasant to watch again despite being a 2004 movie.