THE BOND FILES - Sean Connery was the original holder of the licence to kill. Apart from his splendid portrayal of James Bond, every now and again he has shone in less well advertised movies such as Medicine Man - one of my personal favorites and to my mind a classic. NK

The original James Bond

As the first, Sean Connery is possibly still the most beloved of the actors to play super-spy James Bond. Connery was a bodybuilder who turned to acting, making his way into the movies in the late 1950s. In 1963 he starred as Bond in Dr. No, and by 1971 he had appeared in five more Bond movies, quitting the role after Diamonds Are Forever. He managed to break free of the Bond stereotype in the 1970s, thanks to movies such as the 1975 adventures The Wind and the Lion(with Candice Bergen) and The Man Who Would Be King (with Michael Caine).

During the 1980s and '90s he appeared in dozens of films, and won an Oscar for his supporting role as a grizzled Irish cop in The Untouchables (1987). Eternally hunky and no-nonsense, even as a senior citizen Connery continued to play the love interest to younger actresses such as Catherine Zeta-Jones (in 1999's Entrapment). He also returned to the role of Bond in Never Say Never Again (1983, with Kim Basinger. Although Connery was first denied a knighthood by Britain in 1998 for his support of Scottish nationalism, he was eventually knighted in 2000 by Queen Elizabeth II.

Connery was People magazine's "Sexiest Man Alive" for 1989... Connery has actually quit the role of Bond a few times. He starred in Dr. No (1962), From Russia With Love (1963), Goldfinger (1964), Thunderball(1965) and You Only Live Twice (1967), then gave way to Australian model George Lazenby, who played Bond in On Her Majesty's Secret Service in 1969. Connery again played Bond in Diamonds Are Forever (1971) and then with a wink as an older Bond in Never Say Never Again.

Biography

One of the few movie "superstars" truly worthy of the designation, actor Sean Connery was born to a middle-class Scottish family in the first year of the worldwide Depression. Dissatisfied with his austere surroundings, Connery quit school at 15 to join the navy (he still bears his requisite tattoos, one reading "Scotland Forever" and the other "Mum and Dad"). Holding down several minor jobs, not the least of which was as a coffin polisher, Connery became interested in bodybuilding, which led to several advertising modeling jobs and a bid at Scotland's "Mr. Universe" title. Mildly intrigued by acting, Connery joined the singing-sailor chorus of the London roduction of South Pacific in 1951, which whetted his appetite for stage work. Connery worked for a while in repertory theater, then moved to television, where he scored a success in the BBC's re-staging of the American teledrama Requiem for a Heavyweight. The actor moved on to films, playing bit parts (he'd been an extra in the 1954 Anna Neagle musical Lilacs in the Spring) and working up to supporting roles. Connery's first important movie role was as Lana Turner's romantic interest in Another Time, Another Place (1958) -- although he was killed off 15 minutes into the picture.

After several more years in increasingly larger film and TV roles, Connery was cast as James Bond in 1962's Dr. No; he was far from the first choice, but the producers were impressed by Connery's refusal to kowtow to them when he came in to read for the part. The actor played the secret agent again in From Russia With Love (1963), but it wasn't until the third Bond picture, Goldfinger (1964), that both Connery and his secret-agent alter ego became a major box-office attraction. While the money steadily improved, Connery was already weary of Bond at the time of the fourth 007 flick Thunderball (1965). He tried to prove to audiences and critics that there was more to his talents than James Bond by playing a villain in Woman of Straw (1964), an enigmatic Hitchcock hero in Marnie (1964), a cockney POW in The Hill (1965), and a loony Greenwich Village poet in A Fine Madness (1966).

Nelson Kruschandl - "a great actor"

Despite the excellence of his characterizations, audiences preferred the Bond films, while critics always qualified their comments with references to the secret agent. With You Only Live Twice (1967), Connery swore he was through with James Bond; with Diamonds Are Forever (1971), he really meant what he said. Rather than coast on his celebrity, the actor sought out the most challenging movie assignments possible, including La Tenda Rossa/The Red Tent (1969), The Molly Maguires (1970), and Zardoz (1973). This time audiences were more responsive, though Connery was still most successful with action films like The Wind and the Lion (1974), The Man Who Would Be King (1975), and The Great Train Robbery (1979). With his patented glamorous worldliness, Connery was also ideal in films about international political intrigue like The Next Man (1976), Cuba (1979), The Hunt for Red October (1990), and The Russia House (1990). One of Connery's personal favorite performances was also one of his least typical: In The Offence (1973), he played a troubled police detective whose emotions - and hidden demons -- are agitated by his pursuit of a child molester.

In 1981, Connery briefly returned to the Bond fold with Never Say Never Again, but his difficulties with the production staff turned what should have been a fond throwback to his salad days into a nightmarish experience for the actor. At this point, he hardly needed Bond to sustain his career; Connery had not only the affection of his fans but the respect of his industry peers, who honored him with the British Film Academy award for The Name of the Rose (1986) and an American Oscar for The Untouchables (1987) (which also helped make a star of Kevin Costner, who repaid the favor by casting Connery as Richard the Lionhearted in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves [1991] -- the most highly publicized "surprise" cameo of that year).

While Connery's star had risen to new heights, he also continued his habit of alternating crowd-pleasing action films with smaller, more contemplative projects that allowed him to stretch his legs as an actor, such as Time Bandits (1981), Five Days One Summer (1982), A Good Man in Africa (1994), and Playing by Heart (1998).

James Bond on a Riva speedboat

Although his mercurial temperament and occasionally overbearing nature is well known, Connery is nonetheless widely sought out by actors and directors who crave the thrill of working with him, among them Harrison Ford, Steven Spielberg, and George Lucas, who collaborated with Connery on Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), where the actor played Jones' father. Connery served as executive producer on his 1992 vehicle Medicine Man (1992), and continued to take on greater behind-the-camera responsibilities on his films, serving as both star and executive producer on Rising Sun (1993), Just Cause (1995), and The Rock (1996).

He graduated to full producer on Entrapment (1999), and, like a true Scot, he brought the project in under budget; the film was a massive commercial success and paired Connery in a credible onscreen romance with Catherine Zeta-Jones, a beauty 40 years his junior. He also received a unusual hipster accolade in Trainspotting (1996), in which one of the film's Gen-X dropouts (from Scotland, significantly enough) frequently discusses the relative merits of Connery's body of work. Appearing as Allan Quartermain in 2003's comic-to-screen adaptation of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, the seventy-three year old screen legend proved that he still had stamina to spare and that despite his age he could still appear entirely believeable as a comic-book superhero. Still a megastar in the 1990s, Sean Connery commanded one of moviedom's highest salaries - not so much for his own ego massaging as for the good of his native Scotland, to which he continued to donate a sizable chunk of his earnings.

The hulking yet light-footed Connery was discovered by Harry Saltzman after numerous names as possible contenders for Bond were ruled out or unavailable, including most notably David Niven, who later played Bond in the 1967 spoof Casino Royale, and Cary Grant (who was said to have been part of the inspiration for Bond), who was ruled out after committing to only one film; some sources also suggest that Grant, at 58, turned the role down feeling he was too old for the part. Due to the relatively small budget, the producers were forced to go with an unknown, and Connery was in part cast for that reason.

Ian Fleming, the creator of James Bond, reportedly had doubts about the casting of Connery, on the grounds that the muscular, 6'2" Scotsman was too "unrefined", but a female companion of Fleming's told him that Connery had "it", and reportedly that was good enough for Fleming. The author later changed his doubts about Connery after "Dr. No" premiered and was so impressed he went on to introduce a half-Scottish (and half-Swiss) heritage for his literary character in the later books. Connery's on-screen portrayal of Bond is due in part to tutelage from director Terence Young, who helped to smooth over Connery's rough edges while utilizing his imposing physicality and graceful, cat-like movements during action sequences. Robert Cotton once wrote that in one biography of Connery, Lois Maxwell (who played the first Miss Moneypenny) noticed, "Terence took Sean under his wing. He took him to dinner, showed him how to walk, how to talk, even how to eat." Cotton said, "Some cast members remarked that Connery was simply doing a Terence Young impression, but Young and Connery knew they were on the right track."

Connery's own favorite Bond film was From Russia with Love, one of the most critically acclaimed films in the series. He confirmed this in a 2002 interview with Sam Donaldson for ABCNews.com. (American Movie Classics erroneously listed Thunderball as Connery's favorite during its recent Bond retrospectives.)

In 1967, during the unsatisfying experience of filming You Only Live Twice, Connery quit the role of Bond, having grown tired of the repetitive plots, lack of character development, and the general public's growing demands on him and his privacy (as well as fear of typecasting). This led to the producers hiring George Lazenby to take over the role in 1969's On Her Majesty's Secret Service. However, Lazenby backed out of a seven-film contract, and quit before On Her Majesty's Secret Service was even released, and the film had a mixed response from fans at the time. Broccoli again asked Connery to return to the role and paid him £1.2 million to do so — at the time the highest salary of any actor. Connery returned one final "official" time in 1971's Diamonds Are Forever, quitting the role shortly after release. Connery has also stated that he did not like the direction the Bond franchise was heading in, feeling that the filmmakers were straying too far from the source material.

As a result of a deal between EON Productions and Kevin McClory (co-writer of Thunderball), McClory was given the right to create a remake of Thunderball after 13 years had passed since the release of the original film. In the late 1970s McClory teamed with Connery to write an original James Bond film, but the idea was blocked by lawsuits brought by EON and United Artists. However, the project was revived in the 1980s and Connery signed to play Bond for the seventh and final time (on screen) in the unofficial film Never Say Never Again. The title of the film has long believed to have derived from Connery's comments after the release of Diamonds Are Forever who, after filming it, claimed he would never play James Bond again. (For the legal battle see the controversy of Thunderball)

Connery returned to the role once more in 2005, providing the voice and likeness of James Bond for the video game adaptation of From Russia with Love.

Over 40 years since he first played the role, Connery is still widely regarded as the definitive cinematic incarnation of James Bond, despite popular interpretations of the character by the likes of Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan, and what many believe to be a more literarily-authentic performance by Timothy Dalton. Connery's own feelings on Bond in interviews has run the gamut from bitter resentment to great fondness. At one point he stated he hated the Bond character so much that he'd have killed him, but he has also stated that he never hated Bond, he merely wanted to pursue other roles. Certainly, when the James Bond series was at its peak in the mid-1960s, his association with the 007 image was so intense that different performances in his non-Bond films, such as Alfred Hitchcock's Marnie, A Fine Madness, and Sidney Lumet's The Hill, were being virtually ignored. When asked if he'd ever escape the identification, he replied, "Never. It's with me till I go in the box." At another point, he stated that he still cared about the future of the character and franchise, having been associated with the icon for too long not to care, and that all Bond films had their good points. He praised Pierce Brosnan's performance as Bond in GoldenEye, but was highly critical of Timothy Dalton's portrayal, saying the actor had taken it too seriously and was not cool ^{[citation needed]} (an opinion not shared by his co-star, the late Desmond Llewelyn, who played gadget master Q, who voiced his support of Dalton's portrayal). In December 2005 he also voiced his support for Daniel Craig, the latest actor chosen to play Bond, for Casino Royale.

Sean Connery 007 in Goldfinger

Post-James Bond career

Although his most famous role was that of Bond, Sean Connery has also maintained a successful career since, much more so than any of the other actors who assumed the role. As part of the agreement to appear in Diamonds are Forever, Connery was given carte blanche to produce two films at United Artists but felt that the only film made under this deal, The Offence, was buried by the studio. Apart from The Man Who Would Be King, most of Connery's successes in the next decade were as part of ensemble casts, in films such as Murder on the Orient Express and A Bridge Too Far.

After his experience with Never Say Never Again and the following court case, Connery became unhappy with the major studios and for two years did not make any films. Following the critically celebrated European production The Name of the Rose, for which he won a BAFTA award and universal praise, Connery's interest in more credible material was revived. That same year, a supporting role in Highlander showcased his ability to play older, wise mentors to young, leading protagonists, which certainly became a recurring role in many of his later films. The following year, his highly acclaimed performance as a hard-nosed cop in The Untouchables (1987) earned him an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Subsequent box-office hits such as Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) (in which he played father to Harrison Ford, actually only 12 years his junior), The Hunt for Red October (1990), The Rock (1996), and Entrapment (1999) re-established him as a bankable leading man. Both Last Crusade and The Rock alluded to his James Bond days. Steven Spielberg and George Lucas wanted "the father of Indy" to be Connery since Bond directly inspired the Indiana Jones series, while his character in The Rock, John Patrick Mason, was a British secret service agent imprisoned since the 1960s. In more recent years, Connery's filmography has included its fair share of box office and critical disappointments such as The Avengers (1998) and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003), but he also received positive reviews for films including Finding Forrester (2000). He also later received a Crystal Globe for outstanding artistic contribution to world cinema.

In September 2004, media reports indicated that Connery intended to retire after pulling out of Josiah's Canon, which was set for a 2005 release. However, in a December 2004 interview with The Scotsman newspaper from his home in the Bahamas, Connery explained he had taken a break from acting in order to concentrate on writing his autobiography. However, the book project was later abandoned because the publishers wanted to delve too far into his private life.

Connery has long denied accusations from his first wife Diane Cilento that he physically abused her throughout their marriage. He also courted controversy by condoning the physical abuse of women in a 1965 interview with Playboy magazine, and in a 1993 interview with Vanity Fair (magazine).

About a month before his 75th birthday, over the weekend of July 30th/31st 2005, it was widely reported in the broadcast media (and again in The Scotsman[1]), that he had decided to retire from film making following disillusionment with the "idiots now in Hollywood", and the turmoil making and subsequent box office failure of the 2003 film The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. He stated in interviews for the film included on the DVD release that he was offered roles in both The Matrix and The Lord of the Rings series, declining both due to 'not understanding them', and after they went on to have huge box office grosses he decided to accept the League role despite not 'understanding' it either.

At the Tartan Day celebrations in New York in March 2006, Connery again confirmed his retirement from acting, and stated that he is now writing a history book.

As a personality he has been accused of being an overbearing bully but has also been praised as a highly professional and polite actor, courteous and supportive of those around him. He made a big impression on actors such as Harrison Ford, Kevin Costner, Pat Adams and Christopher Lambert, who considered him a great friend during filming.

His punctual example and highly vocal refusal to tolerate her tardiness left a lasting impression on Catherine Zeta-Jones.

He was planning to star in a $80 million movie about Saladin and the Crusades that would be filmed in Jordan before the producer Moustapha Akkad was killed in the 2005 Amman bombings. Connery received the American Film Institute's Lifetime Achievement Award on 8 June 2006, where he again confirmed his retirement from acting.

Sean Connery at a Tartan Day celebration

in Washington D.C.

Political causes

Connery has long supported the Scottish National Party, a political party campaigning for Scottish independence, both financially and through personal appearances. His involvement in Scottish politics, however, has often provoked severe criticism, since he has not actually lived in Scotland for more than fifty years. His support for the SNP is illustrated by a comment from his official website:

While it is generally accepted that his support of Scotland's independence and the Scottish National Party delayed his knighthood for many years, his commitment to Scotland has never wavered. Politics in the United Kingdom often has more intrigue than a James Bond plot. While Scotland is not yet independent, she does have a new parliament. Sir Sean campaigned hard for the yes vote during the Scottish Referendum that created the new Scottish Parliament. He believes firmly that the Scottish Parliament will grow in power and that Scotland will be independent within his lifetime.

—SeanConnery.com on Sean Connery's support of the Scottish National Party, http://www.seanconnery.com/biography/knighthood/

Connery used half of his fee from Diamonds Are Forever (1971) to establish a charity to support deprived children in Edinburgh as well as Scottish Film production. It was suggested in 1997 that the Labour government had prevented him being knighted for his charitable work because of his support for the SNP. At the time a Labour Party spokesman stated Connery's knighthood had been blocked because of remarks the actor had made in past interviews condoning the physical abuse of women. His nationalist beliefs have often been derided by political opponents, especially given his status as a tax exile living in the Bahamas.

Connery received the Légion d'honneur in 1991. He received Kennedy Center Honors from the United States in 1999, presented to him by President Bill Clinton. He received a knighthood on July 5, 2000, wearing a hunting tartan kilt of the MacLean of Duart clan. He also received the Orden de Manuel Amador Guerrero from Mireya Moscoso, former president of Panama on 11 March 2003, for his talent and versatility as an actor.

Sean Connery 007 in Dr No

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Leonardo DiCaprio plays Howard Hughes, who went from wealthy Texas heir — he inherited his father's tool company — to billionaire tycoon. The film follows his career through the late 1920s and into the 1940s, when Hughes directed and produced films and developed innovative airplanes, all while romancing Hollywood starlets.

Leonardo Di Caprio - Golden Globe Awards

OVERVIEW

MPAA Rating
PG-13 - for thematic elements, sexual content, nudity, language and crash sequence

Genre(s)
Drama, Biography, Historical

Running Time
166 minutes

Starring
Leonardo DiCaprio, Cate Blanchett, Kate Beckinsale, John C. Reilly, Alec Baldwin

Director(s)
Martin Scorsese

Writer(s)
John Logan

Release
Wide Release

Leonardo Di Caprio as Howard Hughes

However conventional Martin Scorsese might be in directing the biopic about Mr. Hughes, he wisely chooses key incidents (set down by scripter John Logan) in the man's life to give us new insight into what makes one of the most interesting figures of the 20th Century tick. A Renaissance man who. having early on inherited a dominant position in his deceased father's prospering tool business, he refuses to spend his life making mundane implements but instead takes great risks that threaten to bankrupt him should his grandiose ideas not pan out–as they often do not. Fascinated by Hollywood particularly at a time that sound features are coming out for the first time, Hughes directs a World War I epic in 1930 called "Hell's Angels," a slow-moving corny story that introduces the world to Jean Harlow, a movie until then unmatched for visual spectacle. His "Scarface" introduced Pul Muni to the screen while "The Outlaw" in 1941 featured Jane Russell in a role that has Hughes face a panel of motion picture censors concerned about the extensive "mammaries" of the celebrated actress.

His activities in buying the RKO Pictures Corporation are skipped over by Scorcese to give the film audience time to watch the man in action as the founder of the Hughes Aircraft Company, personally flying to set a landplane speed record of 352 miles per hour, then lowering the transcontinental flight time record to 7 hours 28 minutes. Ultimately he would work on an eight-engine, wooden flying boat intended to carry 750 passengers, piloting the machine personally in 1947 for one mile.

Key scenes in Scorsese's film at times glorify this larger-than-life figure, making us in the audience root for him when he lands in conflict with those out to crush his company (by now he had purchased TWA) and his spirit. The film is dominated by two major aspects of his adult life: 1) his affairs with Hollywood actresses Katherine Hepburn and Ava Gardner; 2) his fanatical energy both in coming up with ideas and trying to put them into operation.

In the role of Howard Hughes, Leonardo Di Caprio presumably hopes to pick up an Oscar trophy but which, though more than competently performed falls short of the kind of imaginative leap and sympathetic pull on the audience that can be attributed to, say, Don Cheadle as the hotel manager who saves 1,200 members of the Tutsi tribe from Hutu massacre in "Hotel Rwanda." Occasionally shown in extreme close-up, Di Caprio's Hughes comes off as a man whose eyes flash the fire of one possessed, an impatient businessman given to shake his legs impatiently when seated and, strangely enough in two instances to repeat the same words over and over at least a dozen times when he appears not to be under any particular stress. In fact the man comes off best when questioned by the chairman of U.S. Senate committee led by the senator from Maine (played winningly by the always excellent Alan Alda), speaking clearly and strongly without the aid of a lawyer in getting the spectators on his side when accused by the senator of war profiteering.

The Aviator - poster

Scorsese also shows Hughes' fascination with liberated women who come off just short of being attainable. Cate Blanchett in the role of Katherine Hepburn speaks boldly to Hughes as she beats him at golf: close your eyes and listen to her voice and you'd swear that Blanchett is merely lip-synching the words of Hepburn herself. The film's best comic scene takes place in Hepburn's home where each member of her eccentric, extended family blathers on at dinner about a subject of his or her own choosing without focus. When one diner expresses the view that "we don't care about money," Hughes replies, "That's because you have it," an obvious retort but one which does not go over too well with these Connecticut aristocrats.

After Hepburn dumps Hughes because she is in love with the already married Spencer Tracy, he meets his match in an even stronger-willed Ava Gardner (Kate Beckinsale) who, insisting that she is "not for sale" refuses his offer of one of the most exotic sapphire necklaces ever made. "You can buy me dinner," sums her up, but despite her penchant for putting Hughes off, she turns up when the man needs support the most–when holed up in his home, adhesive tape setting the boundaries of almost every square inch to delineate a "germ-free zone."

"The Aviator," which also features Alec Baldwin as the dapper owner of Pan Am seeking to buy Hughes's TWA and John C. Reilly taking care of the business end, is a must-see for students and holders of Master's degrees in Business Administration and by extension for major executives everywhere. Whether it can be sold in the youth market given how young people seem to make heroes out of Michael Jackson and Michael Jordan, is an arguable point, but surely "The Aviator," which, if ever shown on airlines will surely cut a segment that finds Hughes severely injured in a graphically shown crash of his Hercules plane, is a mature, professionally made film, well cast and showing off John Logan's often crackling dialogue–an epic adventure and a solid entry into the film world for the year 2004.

Now He's The King of the Skies!'

His name allegedly derives from his German mother Irmalin's having experienced a sudden kick from her unborn boy while enjoying a DaVinci painting at the Uffizi! In the year following his birth, she and his Italian father George were divorced. He grew up in Echo Park, then a particularly seedy, drug-dominated area of Los Angeles. At five he appeared on his favorite TV show, 'Romper Room,' and was nearly thrown off for misbehaving!

The Aviator - Leonardo Di Caprio takes to the skies

After a string of commercials, educational films ('Mickey's Safety Club'), occasional parts in TV series, a debut film role as Josh in 'Critters 3' (1991), a continuing role as the homeless boy Luke in the TV series 'Growing Pains,' he got his break-through part as Toby in 'This Boy's Life' (1993), co-starring with Robert De Niro and Ellen Barkin. The part led the New York Film Critics and the National Society of Film Critics to name him runner-up for Best Supporting Actor.

His first Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations came for the difficult role of Arnie in 'What's Eating Gilbert Grape' (1993). Equally challenging parts were a drug-troubled Jim Carroll in 'The Basketball Diaries' (1995), the tormented homosexual poet Rimbaud in 'Total Eclipse' (1995) and the male lead in a very updated 'Romeo + Juliet' (1996). True superstardom came to DiCaprio playing Jack Dawson in 'Titanic' in 1997.

Chatting with the young man this afternoon, he is noticably tired due to the premiere last night of his new film, 'The Aviator' - in which the actor assumes the role of the young and complex Howard Hughes. Wearing a black t-shirt, black casual jacket, with his hair slicked back, the perennially youthful 30-year old star, has remained intensely passionate about bringing Hughes' life to the screen for several years. "As an actor, you're constantly searching for that great character," DiCaprio explains, when asked why the fascination for Hughes.

"Also, being a history buff and learning about people in our past and amazing things that they've done, I came across a book about Howard Hughes and he was set up as basically, the most multi-dimensional character I could ever come across. Often, people have tried to define him in biographies, but no one seems to be able to categorize him. He was one of the most complicated men of the last century and so I got this book, brought it to Michael Mann and John Logan came onboard and really came up with the concept, saying, 'you can do ten different movies about Howard Hughes. Let's focus on his younger years.

Let's watch his initial descent into madness but meanwhile, have the backdrop of early Hollywood, these daring pioneers in the world of aviation that were like astronauts that went out and went out and risked their lives to further the cause of aviation. [He was] the first American billionaire who had all the resources in the world but was somehow unable to find any sense of peace of happiness'. It's that great see-saw act in the movie that goes on. On one side, he's having all the successes in the world and on the other side the tiny microbes and germs are the things that are taking him downwards."

What level of admiration do you have for this great man?

"I think he certainly took things farther than I could ever imagine," the actor insists. "He was such an obsessed human being and remained so obsessive about everything he'd gotten involved with, whether it be planes, women or films, he made."

While DiCaprio has remained as ferociously guarded about his private life as Hughes was intensely shy, the actor says those two apparent parallels are miles apart from each other. "I have to say, that for the most part, I am a pretty private person while his came from a genuine mental disorder and I'm just fundamentally not like that. My reasons for being a private person are different from Mr. Hughes, in that because I'm an actor and want people to believe me in different roles and not necessarily know way too much about me. I want to be around in the business for a long time, while he had an intense fear of being around people and germs."

While 'The Aviator' is a film about the early youthful ambitions of Howard Hughes, when it comes to DiCaprio's own childhood dreams and obsessions, the actor says there was really only one, "... ever since I got into this business at around 13 years old and that was to be in this business forever. Once I did my first television commercial, I caught that itch, that bug, and said, it is possible to make a living doing this for the rest of my life, that is the only thing I really want to do. He had multiple dreams. I look at film and cinema as legitimate an art form as sculpture, painting or anything else. We're in the first hundred years of cinema, which is still in its infancy and I'm very curious to see what types of films last into the next thousand years, just like what paintings people still look at. I want to be a part of pieces of art as far as cinema is concerned, that people will want to see for generations to come."

Who was one of your greatest influences during your formative years?

"I remember the casting session that I had where I was a break dancer, having this punk hair cut. They rejected me and I became really disillusioned with the business and said well this is what it's all about, and I haven't even got in to read a line. My father said don't worry, some day we're going to get you back into this and it's going to happen for you, which I kind of took to heart," DiCaprio recalls. "It was one of those situations where I was lucky and fortunate enough to be at the right places at the right time", he adds, referring to his early television breaks that included the likes of 'Parenthood' and 'Growing Pains.' "All of a sudden I was on the set of 'Growing Pains' and got this audition for 'This Boy's Life' and was able to jump into the feature film world. It's really been just simply the fact that I'd been able to work, you know what I mean? I would probably still be trying to be an actor even if I was out of work, but I would probably become a little disillusioned at some point and move on to other things. But it's the one thing that I know that I love."

As for future projects, DiCaprio says they do not include 'Alexander the Great,' which at one time was going to be a Scorsese project. "Alexander The Great was one of those things where Scorsese and I just share the same taste in similar things. We were both fascinated with Alexander The Great as well as Howard Hughes. They're completely different time periods and different men, but similar dynamics, men that keep on reaching for their ultimate goal and stop at nothing until they achieve that. It just happened to be that this script and project was way further advanced in the development stage than the script that landed in our lap from 'Alexander' and we wanted to go forth - we had an intention at one time of doing them both, but you don't get everything you want all the time."

Director Martin Scorsese puts the disappointment of Gangs Of New York behind him to breathe life into complex American playboy Howard Hughes.

A legend in American history, the range and depth of his character needed a resourceful actor to capture his essence - Leonardo DiCaprio. Only lingering on Hughes' childhood to cast light on his cleanliness obsession (his mother terrified him with tales of cholera), Scorsese skilfully sketches in the character of the man courtesy of his sideline as movie producer.

So we see the young movie mogul blowing millions on the World War I flying feature Hell's Angels, badgering a rival studio for cameras and ordering Ian Holm's meteorologist to "find clouds". The movie had to be re-shot to accommodate the new-fangled soundtrack and also cost the lives of three stunt pilotsbut proved a box office smash. Unencumbered by doubt and driven by an uncompromising quest for perfection, the obsessive maverick would go on to apply his obsessive standards to the Hughes Aircraft Company, and subsequently TWA.

The aircraft-obsessed mogul also enjoyed a high-flying personal life, squiring the likes of Joan Crawford, Jean Harlow and Bette Davis. The spikily intelligent Katharine Hepburn (Blanchett, superb) is the irascible love of his life, while Kate Beckinsale gives good hair-toss as Ava Gardner. Focused and beautifully paced, this doesn't disappoint visually, with some stunningly shot aerial shots, particularly Hughes' roof-tile shattering crash-landing in the Hollywood Hills. Hughes was such a larger-than-life character that he needed a director with larger-than-life skills to capture his spirit. Scorsese is well up to the task.

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THE AVIATOR

(Cinematografo.it/Adnkronos) - The Aviator è il miglior film del 2004. A incoronare il kolossal di Martin Scorsese sulla vita del miliardario produttore Howard Hughes è stata la Conferenza Episcopale degli Stati Uniti (Usccb) che ha premiato, oltre al valore dell'opera, l'impegno del regista nel diffondere un messaggio allo stesso tempo didattico e ludico. Nella top ten stilata dalla Usccb compare, all'ottavo posto, anche il discusso film di Mel Gibson sulle ultime 12 ore di vita di Gesù, La Passione di Cristo.

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Drame biographique réalisé par Martin Scorsese. Avec Leonardo DiCaprio, Cate Blanchett, John C. Reilley, Kate Beckinsale.

ÇA RACONTE : Les 20 premières années de la carrière professionnelle du milliardaire Howard Hughes, passionné de cinéma, d'aviation, et de femmes.

ON NOTE : Tournée en grande partie à Montréal, cette imposante production est née grâce à l'entêtement de Leonardo DiCaprio qui, après avoir travaillé un temps avec le cinéaste Michael Mann, a ensuite fait appel à Martin Scorsese (celui-là même qui l'a dirigé dans Gangs of New York) pour assurer la réalisation de ce drame biographique. Un parfum de l'Hollywood des années de gloire.

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Howard Hughes and the Spruce Goose

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Di Caprio Flying High

Leonardo DiCaprio/The Aviator Interview by Paul Fischer in Los Angeles.

Leonardo Di Caprio apologised for appearing so tired. "It was the premiere last night", he says, with a sheepish grin, referring to the screening of The Aviator, in which the actor assumes the role of the young and complex Howard Hughes Wearing a black t-shirt, black casual jacket, with his hair slicked back, the perennially youthful 30-year old star, has remained intensely passionate about bringing Hughes' life to the screen for several years. "As an actor, you're constantly searching for that great character,"Di Caprio explains, when asked why the fascination for Hughes. "Also, being a history buff and learning about people in our past and amazing things that they've done, I came across a book about Howard Hughes and he was set up as basically, the most multi-dimensional character I could ever come across. Often, people have tried to define him in biographies, but no one seems to be able to categorize him.

He was one of the most complicated men of the last century and so I got this book, brought it to Michael Mann and John Logan came onboard and really came up with the concept, saying, 'you can do ten different movies about Howard Hughes. Let's focus on his younger years. Let's watch his initial descent into madness but meanwhile, have the backdrop of early Hollywood, these daring pioneers in the world of aviation that were like astronauts that went out and went out and risked their lives to further the cause of aviation. [He was] the first American billionaire who had all the resources in the world but was somehow unable to find any sense of peace of happiness'. It's that great see-saw act in the movie that goes on. On one side, he's having all the successes in the world and on the other side the tiny microbes and germs are the things that are taking him downwards."

Di Caprio says that while there are parallels between himself and Hughes, "I think he certainly took things farther than I could ever imagine," the actor insists. He was such an obsessed human being and remained so obsessive about everything he'd gotten involved with, whether it be planes, women or films, he made." While Di Caprio has remained as ferociously guarded about his private life ass Hughes was intensely shy, the actor says those two apparent parallels are miles apart from each other. "I have to say, that for the most part, I am a pretty private person while his came from a genuine mental disorder and I'm just fundamentally not like that. My reasons for being a private person are different from Mr. Hughes, in that because I'm an actor and want people to believe me in different roles and not necessarily know way too much about me. I want to be around in the business for a long time, while he had an intense fear of being around people and germs."

But is Hughes' celebrity that still offers a certain degree of parallel in the young life of Di Caprio, but while Hughes' female conquests remain fascinating as an almost historical legacy for Hughes, Di Caprio laughs when asked about his own place in history when he dates someone. "No, those aren't my intentions going into a relationship," and unlike Howard, Di Capriois not a collector of women. "I honestly feel that as much as he had love and adoration for these women and genuinely cared for them, he kind of looked at them like airplanes. He was a technical genius and obsessed with finding the new, faster, bigger airplane," he adds, laughingly, "and that was simultaneous with women. He was constantly finding the new hotter female to go out with, which all related back to him being orphaned at a very young age and having this empty hole in his soul, which I think he was always trying to fill with new, more exciting things in his life. He ended up, obviously, not a very happy person. I don't know if he was think about whether, historically, he was going to become a legend. I'm sure he had that sort of cat and mouse things going on in his mind where he wanted to be famous but it was more like 'look at me! Look at me! No, don't look at me'."

Dreams do not come true to all who have such lofty ambitions, and in an industry riddled with rejection, the actor says that his father was a great influences during his formative years. "I remember the casting session that I had where I was a break dancer, having this punk hair cut. They rejected me and I became really disillusioned with the business and said well this is what it's all about, and I haven't even got in to read a line.

Leonardo Di Caprio and Cate Blanchett

26 January 2005

Scorsese's 'The Aviator' takes off with 11 Oscar nominations

BEVERLY HILLS, California : "The Aviator" soared high above Tuesday's Oscar nominations, snatching 11 nods, including best picture, best actor and best director for the epic story of US billionaire Howard Hughes.

In a year dominated by real-life stories but filled with few surprises, the film dominated the nominations for the 77th annual Academy Awards when they were unveiled by Oscar-winner Adrien Brody and Oscars chief Frank Pierson at a pre-dawn ceremony.


Tying for second place in cinema's great race were "Finding Neverland," the story of Peter Pan author J.M. Barrie, and Clint Eastwood's drama "Million Dollar Baby," with seven nods each, including best picture.

Red-hot star Jamie Foxx, 37, became the early leader in the best actor competition after winning an expected nomination for his acclaimed performance as blind soul legend Ray Charles in "Ray."

"The Aviator" snagged a best actor nod for "Titanic" heartthrob Leonardo DiCaprio in his role as the eccentric Hughes, best director for long-overlooked Martin Scorsese and best supporting actor nominations for Cate Blanchett as Katharine Hepburn and for Alan Alda.

"'The Aviator' is flying high and is hoping to become the first movie about Hollywood to win Hollywood's top award," awards pundit Tom O'Neil told AFP of the 110-million-dollar picture.

The film also picked up nods for best cinematography, costume design, art direction, film editing, sound mixing and original screenplay.

"Bringing 'The Aviator' to the screen took years of effort by an extraordinary group of individuals," Scorsese said in a statement, adding that he wwas thrilled at the recognition.

Historically, the film that led the Oscar nominations has gone on to win the best picture statuette in 18 of the last 20 years.

Following "Aviator," "Neverland" and "Baby" in the nomination stakes were "Ray," with six nods, including best picture, best actor for Foxx and best director for Taylor Hackford; the bittersweet California road movie "Sideways," with five, including best picture and best director for Alexander Payne; and Disney-Pixar's animated "The Incredibles," with four.

Four out of the five best actor nominees played real-life characters, including Foxx, DiCaprio, Johnny Depp as J.M. Barrie and Don Cheadle as hotel manager Paul Rusesabagina in the genocide drama "Hotel Rwanda."

The only one to play a fictional character was veteran screen icon Eastwood, 74, who won a nod for his role as tough old boxing coach Frankie Dunn in "Baby," for which he also won a best director nomination.

But Liam Neeson missed out on a nod for his role as a famed sexologist in "Kinsey," and "Sideways" star Paul Giamatti was also notably snubbed.

The competition is stiff for best actress, as previous Oscar-winner Hilary Swank, nominated this year for her role as a tragic female boxer in "Baby," faces off against Annette Bening for her portrayal of an aging actress in "Being Julia."

They are pitted against Britons Imelda Staunton, for the 1950s abortion saga "Vera Drake," and Kate Winslet, for "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," as well as Catalina Sandino Moreno, for the Spanish-language drug-running story "Maria Full of Grace."

Swank, 30, won the best actress Oscar for playing a sexually conflicted woman in 1999's "Boys Don't Cry."

A heavyweight lineup also dominates this year's directing race, with Eastwood facing off against "Taxi Driver" filmmaker Scorsese, 62, Hackford, Payne and "Vera Drake" filmmaker Mike Leigh. "Neverland" director Marc Forster was shut out.

Scorsese, who has been nominated for a total of six Oscars in the past but has never won, is tipped as the favourite in the category.

Foxx won a second nod as best supporting actor for the Tom Cruise thriller "Collateral," becoming only the 10th actor to be recognised in both categories in the same year.

He is now locked in a showdown for best supporting actor with Thomas Haden Church for "Sideways," Alda for "The Aviator," Morgan Freeman for "Million Dollar Baby" and Briton Clive Owen for the sexual intrigue "Closer."

Australia's Blanchett won a best supporting actress nod for playing screen legend Katharine Hepburn in "The Aviator," joining Britain's Sophie Okonedo for "Hotel Rwanda," Laura Linney for "Kinsey," Virginia Madsen for "Sideways" and Natalie Portman for "Closer."

Human tragedy pervaded the best foreign-language film category, with Spain's "The Sea Inside," a drama about a paraplegic's fight to die, and South Africa's AIDS drama "Yesterday" leading the nominations.

They face competition from France's "Les Choristes," Germany's "Downfall," a recreation of the last days of Adolf Hitler, and "As It Is In Heaven," from Sweden's Kay Pollak.

The Oscar nominations formally shift Tinseltown's annual awards season into high gear as studios and stars jostle to win the hearts of the 5,800 Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences voters.

The 2005 golden statuettes will be handed out at a glittering ceremony in Hollywood on February 27

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