Continuity mistake: Near the beginning of the film where Howard Hughes flight tests the silver monoplane (the H-1), the close up shots show an open cockpit while the longer shots show a closed cockpit.
The Aviator (2004)
Ending / spoiler
Directed by: Martin Scorsese
Starring: Alec Baldwin, Cate Blanchett, John C. Reilly, Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Beckinsale, Ian Holm
Howard Hughes' Spruce Goose flies with success. As the victory celebration takes place, Howard suffers from his mental disability and keeps on repeating, "The way of the future", over and over. As he cools off in a restroom, he remembers himself as a boy saying that he wants to make movies, fly planes and become a rich man.
Doug Hryniuk
Howard Hughes: What the hell does a senator from Maine need to fly to Peru for?
Trivia: At the Academy Awards, Cate Blanchett became the first Oscar winner to win her award for playing another Oscar winner.
Question: The colors in this film are otherworldly, (almost like the colors in a black and white movie that has been artificially colorized) and could not have been natural or achieved with any net or filter. I'm fairly certain that there is no method of stylized pre-exposure, and digital colorization, while possible, would have been painstaking on such a grand scale. How did they accomplish it?
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Answer: The first sections of the film are shot in two-strip and three-strip technicolor, a common practice in the early versions of color filmmaking that were happening at the time. The scene on the golf course between Howard and Kate Hepburn is a prime example. As far as the later sections of the film, never underestimate the power of digital effects. :)