If you avoided the movie Amelia (2009) in the theater because of the bad reviews, you might want to check it out on DVD/Blu Ray/HBO. The movie about Amelia Earhart may not be a great movie, but it is an entertaining story about one of the most interesting people from the early twentieth century.
I may have a lower standard for biography movies than fictional movies because biopics have the added bonus of teaching me about events that actually happened while I also realize that the director and writer are restrained by true-life events. For example, because we don’t have the information, the movie rightfully avoids showing the actual crash that ended Earhart’s life in her 1937 attempt to circle the world, although it follows her up until the moment radio contact was lost. A fictional story would have been able to dramatize the crash. Further, biopics often are restrained to a certain formula to try to cover a large number of years in a person’s life and to make it a cohesive story. That’s one of the reasons that Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story was able to do such a funny send-up of otherwise excellent biopics like Ray and Walk the Line.
Amelia Earhart’s life was so ground-breaking it’s difficult to convey how important she was for aviation and women’s rights in less than two hours. But the movie does a good job in telling the story, with excellent acting from Hillary Swank as Earhart and Richard Gere as her husband, George Putnam.
One small piece of history I learned was that when Gore Vidal was a child, he knew Amelia Earhart because his father had a relationship with her. Gore has seen a lot of American history.
Earhart was an amazing person and aviation pioneer: first woman across the Atlantic as part of a crew in 1928, first woman and second person to fly solo across the Atlantic in 1932, first person to fly solo across the Pacific between Hawaii and California, as well as a leadership role in several organizations promoting aviation. The movie does a decent job of telling the story, and it’s worth a rental.
Bonus History Tidbit: Who was the second person to fly an airplane non-stop across the Atlantic after Lindbergh? Clarence Chamberlin, although he carried a passenger. He was in the competition for the Orteig Prize money with Charles Lindbergh and others to be the first to fly an airplane across the Atlantic. He would have beaten Lindbergh, but a former navigator sued him and kept him grounded for awhile, which allowed Lindbergh to beat Chamberlin.
Chamberlin flew across the Atlantic on June 4-6, 1927. Lindbergh made his flight on May 20-21, 1927, winning by just two weeks. Had Chamberlin beaten Lindbergh, would Lindbergh still have been the national hero? It’s possible, as his was the first solo flight, but the media focus was on on being the first non-stop flight and winning the $25,000 Orteig prize, and Chamberlin would have won the prize if he were first. If Chamberlin had been the national hero, would that have spared Lindbergh the tragedy of his son being kidnapped and killed? Would it have spared America of seeing its national hero accused of being pro-Nazi? Few have heard of Chamberlin because Lindbergh beat him, and Chamberlin may have been the lucky one after all.
Missed Movies is our series on very good movies that many people did not see when first released.
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After writing the above review, I watched a 1976 TV movie, “Amelia Earhart,” with Susan Clark in the starring role. Interestingly, the IMDb website has a higher rating for the TV movie than the recent theatrical release, but that may be due to lowered expectations.
The TV movie, not surprisingly, is not as good as “Amelia,” and it is a bit too long, but it does a decent job. The TV movie tries to cover more of the famous flyer’s life than “Amelia” does, and so one may learn some additional information from the older movie. Interestingly, the TV movie portrays George Putnam in a less flattering light than “Amelia” (with the Richard Gere role being played by John Forsythe of “Dynasty” and “Charlie’s Angels” fame). Also, the TV movie replaces “Amelia’s” focus on secondary male lead of Gene Vidal (Ewan McGregor) with flying instructor Paul Mantz (Stephen Macht). I’m not sure which is more accurate about the personal relationships, but if you’re looking to watch an interesting movie, I’d recommend “Amelia” over the TV movie.