Ric has put up
part I of his review of the movie in the news section.
I'm copying the review I wrote for the
IMDB messages board. I hope others will post their thoughts in this thread, too.
If you have the time, please send me YOUR OPINION of the movie?
In one sentence:
I enjoyed it far more than I thought I would.
Disclaimers:
1. I am an Ameliaholic.
2. I love airplanes. My Dad was a flight surgeon in the Navy during the Korean war. I built model airplanes in grammar school and high school. I fly radio-controlled airplanes (and the occasional helicopter) nowadays.
3. I've been to Oshkosh a couple of times. I've seen the Electra replica with my own eyes--among HUNDREDS of other classic aircraft there.
4. I'm not a movie maven. I understand the kinds of things that have been getting flak from the critics. My opinion would carry no weight with them. They are judging on a whole set of different scales.
5. I didn't see
Night at the Museum. I have no objections to Swank being cast as Amelia. I don't know enough about contemporary actresses to have an opinion on that.
BEWARE: SPOILERS * SPOILERS * SPOILERS * SPOILERS * SPOILERS * SPOILERS *
BEWARE: SPOILERS * SPOILERS * SPOILERS * SPOILERS * SPOILERS * SPOILERS *
Things I liked:
1. I found the love stories appealing. I'm a Jesuit priest, so I'm not condoning AE's attitudes towards marriage and fidelity, but the movie became quite conventional--and maybe a-historical?--when she broke off with Vidal,
returned to GP, and finally told him she loved him in their last conversation in the movie. I don't know whether that is an accurate representation of their relationship, but I found it a lovely arc in the storyline.
2. Lots and lots of airplanes onscreen. I loved them all. Probably not going to sell many people on the movie.
3. I generally liked the scenes with Fred Noonan and AE. Other posters said that the movie blames Fred for the loss, but I didn't see it that way at all. He was the kind of guy who drank (there are some letters about that); he may have had a wandering eye; it's not inconceivable that he would have made a pass at AE somewhere along the line. As he suggests (using other words), guys are like that.
4. I appreciated the sub-plot about AE's experience of her father as an alcoholic. It was a chord sounded relatively subtly throughout the movie and it makes her reaction to Fred's drinking all the more poignant (to me).
5. I thoroughly enjoyed Swank's performance. To my eye and taste, she is lovely and made a very convincing Earhart. AE was much more worn by the stress of flying and the years of making a living in the public eye, but I understand that it would be very difficult and probably distracting if the makeup artists tried to apply those details to Swank's face. Putnam trained AE to keep her lips closed in publicity photos so as to hide the gap in her front teeth; the moviemakers chose not to portray that aspect of AE's life, so the big smiles were unreal--more Swank than Earhart--but OK by me.
6. I liked the ending, all things considered. I think they played the final disappearance of the aircraft very well.
Things I didn't like: I am going to pass over these in silence. There were probably two or three dozen details that would only concern continuity sticklers and other aviation buffs like myself. I plan to buy the DVD and watch the movie with and without commentary, making notes on the things that made me grind my teeth. Someday I'll put up a table somewhere of my gripes.
I guess that there were under 70 people in the theater (Dipson Amherst 3, across from the UB campus, 7:20 PM). Most of them were my age (57) or older. No children, no obvious groups of UB students. Everybody sat quietly through the first minute or so of credits; perhaps two dozen stayed to the very end.
Marty
TIGHAR #2359