Amelia...

kssunflower · Post by **kssunflower** » Fri Oct 30, 2009 6:49 pm

...she never gets off the runway in Mira Nair's new movie.

I really looked forward to this film after having toured her birthplace in Atchison twice. Mediocre at best and I think most of the problem was with the script. Hillary Swank really resembled her physically, but didn't seem to be able to capture much of her spirit or charisma that I've read about over the years. The dialogue was pretty limited and there was zero chemistry between her and Gere. Also, she seemed to be channeling Katharine Hepburn with her voice and accent. No native Kansan I know speaks like that. The movie to me was just a series of events and accomplishments with little character development.

DJ · Post by DJ » Sat Oct 31, 2009 3:54 pm

Heard Gore Vidal speaking on a CNN "Book Notes" event earlier this year-- his father, who held an aviation administration position under FDR, dated Amelia during the '20s-- so GV knew her rather intimately for a while. He believes she was depressed at the time she was making her circumnavigating-the-globe flight, that she konked her navigator over the head, and took her plane down in the Pacific, on purpose. The disappearance certainly has secured her legend.
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BTW: My paternal grandfather, who had a beauty salon/barbershop on Main Street in Anderson, S.C., once cut her hair! How I wish he had saved some of her auburn tresses ....

augusta · Post by **augusta** » Sun Nov 01, 2009 10:33 am

That is so funny, DJ. I guess it could have happened. Her navigator, Fred Noonan, was an alcoholic, wasn't he? I think she was apprehensive about using him in case he started drinking on the trip, and I'm not sure if he did or didn't, but seems like she didn't get along real great with him. Her photos at her different stops on her last trip really show the fatigue in her face like no others. Some say she might have been pregnant. Some say she was on a stomach medicine.

There's a good website called something like Tighar that is the group that thinks she lived on Nocomororo Island and have thought they found the cap from her stomach medicine and a sole from her shoe. They had expected to find her plane sunk near the island but never found it. They used to put up some really cool old papers about her. I haven't gone to that site in years - I should. They had a 2-hour tv show on it with I think Lindsay Wagner hosting(?).

Fargo, thanks for posting on the movie. I missed it. Personally I think Richard Gere is boring. I've seen Hillary Swank in a bunch of stuff and always enjoyed her acting. They didn't have her do a Kansas accent? I don't know why they didn't try to make her sound like her - there's enough film clips of her talking to study at least some. Seems like she had a space between her front teeth. What would it have hurt to have added that (if they didn't)? These little touches are not so little, and I think if they're gonna take all that money and work to make a movie about a real person, they should strive for accuracy.

Oh, you lucky lady, you - touring AE's home twice! Did you see the window where a baby girl her mother had was in a cradle and was hit by lightening and was killed? How awful!

I watched the movie with Susan Clark before and didn't like it. I liked Diane Keaton's portrayal. And it had a bit of the real story in it. In an interview, Diane Keaton said, "I had the haircut!", meaning like she was half-way there to portraying her.

A good biography I've read on AE is called "The Sound of Wings". I think she deserves a good, theatre-released, historically accurate movie done on her. Who did Richard Gere play? George Putnam? It sounds like I didn't miss anything. Good.

kssunflower · Post by **kssunflower** » Sun Nov 01, 2009 4:23 pm

The film portrays Noonan as definitely an alcoholic, even making a pass at her when he was inebriated. It also seems to point the finger of blame at him on their tragic final flight when they're attempting to contact the Itasca. He is shown sitting in the rear of the plane panicking and not sure what to do.

Yes, Richard Gere was Putnam, or G.P. as she called him. I knew they had a very unconventional marriage and perhaps the lack of chemistry in the movie has something to do with the director trying to convey that. It also had a few scenes regarding her flirtations with Gene Vidal. Regarding the gap between her front teeth - Putnam instructed her to smile with her lips closed to hide it.

The last time I visited her family home was in the mid '90's. It's a beautiful Gothic Revival style house dating to I believe the early 1860's. I'm not aware of the incident regarding a child struck by lightning. When did this occur?

stargazer · Post by **stargazer** » Mon Nov 02, 2009 12:27 pm

I recall reading that she didn't take the trailing antenna because it was awkward ? or something. Maybe one day the plane will be found. I think that GP pushed her too hard, and that she travelled to get away from him. Nowadays, she could tell him to go take a flying leap.

DJ · Post by DJ » Mon Nov 02, 2009 4:02 pm

Gore V. was deathly serious about Amelia being depressed, with the misbegotten marriage to Putnam factoring in heavily. If you're suicidal and go down in a plane over the ocean, who's to know?
Anyway, just sharing. He spoke of her at length, with great fondness and admiration. (Not as if he were attempting an, ahem, hatchet job.)

kssunflower · Post by **kssunflower** » Thu Nov 05, 2009 8:21 pm

stargazer @ Mon Nov 02, 2009 12:27 pm wrote:I recall reading that she didn't take the trailing antenna because it was awkward ? or something.

Though not great, the movie has renewed my interest in her and I've done a bit more reading. It seems there's a controversy as to whether the antenna was present and broke off during takeoff from Lae, New Guinea, or whether she intentionally left it off.

augusta · Post by **augusta** » Sat Nov 14, 2009 10:07 am

She had trouble with something - was it the radio? She didn't take the time to learn how to work it well.

It seems like she hated that trailing antenna. This plays a part in the story, but I can't remember offhand just what it was. Your posts are ringing bells.

I'll go down to the basement, kssunflower, and get the book on her that I read the episode of one of her mother's babies getting hit by lightening thru an open window while it was in its cradle.

She set other records, too, in flying. A lot of people said she couldn't fly very well and point out a crash or two on the runways, and blame her last one on that. I disagree. I don't think she could have done all that flying successfully if she wasn't much good at it, and a lot of planes crash on the runways.

Her sister lived until a very old age. She is interviewed on one or more documentaries about her, and it's so neat to see her and listen to what she has to say.

I can see where they'd put Noonan flirting with her. Amelia and GP (I had forgotten she called him that!) had an open marriage. But if they had that flirting going on in the plane on their last flight, nobody would have ever known that to be fact. Seems to me she couldn't stand him, but one or two other guys quit and she was stuck with him. If she couldn't stand him, I'd think he'd know and wouldn't make a real pass at her.

kssunflower · Post by **kssunflower** » Sat Nov 14, 2009 1:45 pm

Augusta, I don't believe that incident with Noonan making a pass really occurred. Several TIGHAR members on other blogs I've read have refuted it. You know Hollywood - it was probably just to add more spice to the script. I've been reading excerpts from both 'East To The Dawn' and 'The Sound of Wings' when I'm in the bookstore. Trying to decide which one to buy. They are both good books about a great lady.

augusta · Post by **augusta** » Sun Nov 15, 2009 12:20 am

I found the source for the baby. Oops - it was a baby of Amelia's grandmother, not mother. (Sorry.)

This comes from "The Sounds of Wings", c 1989, St. Martin's Press, NY, page 4:

"The Earharts had twelve children, three of whom died of scarlet fever and one who was killed in her cradle when a bolt of lightening shot through an open window. It was their son Edwin Stanton Earhart who was to become the father of Amelia."

Not too bad from reading this book once about 20 years ago. That's how much it impressed me. I'd never heard of such a thing happening. I had heard warnings to stay away from windows in a thunderstorm. Now I sure do! What a horrible thing.

augusta · Post by **augusta** » Sun Nov 15, 2009 12:37 am

I found a clipping in that "Sound of Wings" book. It's from "Weekly World News" (the tabloid that printed far out articles that had to be made up), dated March 23, 1993. The headline says "Amelia Earhart Comes Home!"

It says that she had lived on an island all these years and married the chieftain. Of course nobody was allowed access to the island other than this guy from Australia. She was coming to the US for a heart bypass operation. She was 96 years old.

I know this is a bunch of hooey, but I don't know if a doctor would do a bypass on someone who is 96 years old. I guess it depends on the individual's health.

Anyway, I scanned the picture for laughs.