Review: ‘The Amazing Howard Hughes' on DVD

I finally caught up with the 1977 made-for-TV movie called The Amazing Howard Hughes. I happened upon the DVD at our local library. It’s about two hours long and stars Tommy Lee Jones in the title role.

Please note that this review is based on the DVD version. I understand from the Amazon.com citizen critics that the DVD is a poor cousin of the original miniseries, which was longer and therefore better. Apparently the full miniseries has been shown on cable but I haven’t seen it. If anyone has a VHS or DVD copy of the full miniseries, I’d be very interested in seeing it and writing about it.

The first half of of the DVD version — covering roughly the first half of Hughes’ life — isn’t horrible. Jones does a pretty decent impression of the young and dashing Hughes. The story hits the usual highlights, from taking control of his late father's company to movie making to plane flying (and crashing) to courting Hollywood starlets. Interestingly, the first half of the film is weakest in portraying Hughes’ love life, giving short shrift to almost all the interesting stuff.

Another oddity: At least twice, we see Hughes amusing himself by playing the saxophone (and playing very well). My knowledge of Hughes is not encyclopedic but I’ve never read or heard anything about him playing the sax.

After Hughes flies the Hercules in 1947 — marking the end of Martin Scorsese’s superior The Aviator — the movie ventures into Hughes’ later life, when his eccentricities become more pronounced. After basically skipping a decade of time, his Las Vegas years begin promisingly with his clandestine move into the Desert Inn, but then end rather abruptly as he departs for the Bahamas. The movie suggests that he left Las Vegas because he feared the nearby nuclear testing, but that of course is not the case. The dramatic battle for control of Hughes’ empire in the wake of his departure from Las Vegas is not mentioned at all, as the movie turns immediately to the Clifford Irving affair.

The Amazing Howard Hughes leaves viewers wondering what exactly happened to the billionaire in his later years. There is almost nothing in the film about his abuse of painkillers following his near-fatal crash in 1946, and almost no effort is made to try to explain why he becomes a bedridden paranoid recluse.

The movie is based on a memoir written by Noah Dietrich, who was Hughes’ longtime righthand man but parted ways with him in 1956. Knowing this, it’s perhaps easier to understand why the movie falls apart in portraying Hughes’ life after Dietrich was out of the picture.

All things considered, I found The Amazing Howard Hughes watchable but I can’t imagine anyone other than diehard Hughes followers — and perhaps Tommy Lee Jones fanatics, whoever they might be — having much interest in it. Perhaps the full miniseries holds together better.