The Aviator

As one of the most highly acclaimed movies of any year, The Aviator has a heck of a reputation to live up to. It does so admirably. The life of Howard Hughes is a very interesting topic to cover, not the least because he was such a quirky personality, but also because he was such an economic force in the airline industry and, though not part of the time covered by the movie, the Las Vegas gaming industry.
This movie features Leo DiCaprio at his best, portraying the obsessive-compulsive Hughes with a lot of intensity, particularly when his personality goes through a severe breakdown that sends him into a seclusion broken only by the need to testify in front of the Senate. There are other excellent performances by Alan Alda and, especially, Cate Blanchett as Kate Hepburn (the Oscar is well deserved). Again, I marvel that the Oscar didn't go to Martin Scorsese (if any man deserves life-time achievement, it's him) but at least he lost to another excellent director in Clint Eastwood.
As far as the direct subject matter goes, The Aviator focuses on Hughes's life between his making of Hell's Angels, a WWI aviation movie, in the 1920s through his 1947 test flight of the "Spruce Goose" (a nickname he didn't like). They portray his relationships with Kate Hepburn and Ava Gardner, his building of TWA and breaking Pan Am's monopoly on international passenger flights, and his love of experimental aircraft, including a near fatal crash of an prototypical recon airplane. And of course, they also show us the private Hughes with his dubious mental health.
I give the movie an A.