This movie depicts the facts of Amelia Earhart's fantastic life, her flights were nothing short of miraculous, for the times and the equipment available at the time. Not much is known about her private life, even though she had written books, those were about her flying experiences, where she had been and how it felt to fly. I disagree with one review that says that her private life was too matter of fact in the telling throughout the film, rather than making them events in and of themselves. It appears to me that Amelia wasn't forthcoming about her private life at the time, as a result, not much was known about her love life, relationships etc. certainly not enough to put into the film, if they had made it up it would have changed the designation to 'based on facts' not the bio pic it is. Putnam, the writer would or perhaps did write about his love for her, but his relationship with Amelia started out in a businesslike way and ended the same way, despite the reliance they had on each other. What stood out in this film was Amelia's first and only love -flying a plane to somewhere she had never been. The fact that Amelia was the first women to accomplish those personal goals was interesting and novel for that time period. The movie was successful in setting out Amelia's sense of adventure, courage, human spirit to excel and Amelia breaking boundaries by a woman, and in flight.

A spoiler for this film wold be different. It's not a bad film-I am a fan of Hilary Swank so I liked it because she was in it if nothing more. There was no new light shed on the story of Amelia Earhart by this movie nor did I really expect anything new from it either. It is well done both from an acting and a setting perspective with very detailed sets that look exactly like I imagine it wold have looked back in the time of Amelia Earhart. There are many theories about what happened to Amelia Earhart but I find that mostly people talk about some very thin ocean floor evidence or some equally thin photographic evidence concerning what is supposedly part of a plane sticking out of the water on the beach of some tiny island in the Pacific. A bit of research will reveal Canton island as in interesting possibility as a landing place for Amelia Earhart. Canton was used as a LAN radio base in WW2 but had previously been used in 1937 to host a National Geographic gathering to witness a full solar eclipse at Canton island on June 8 1937. Amelia reportedly went missing on July 2 1937. Women like Amelia were into being aviation pioneers and in 1937 they were getting ready to start crossing the Pacific in big four engined planes that needed to refuel-in places like Canton- which was actually subsequently used to land & refuel the big Pacific crossing passenger planes of the day. Maybe Amelia went off to pilot such planes and be the first women airline pilot in lieu of seeking fame in other area of aviation that she was perhaps tired with. Anyway, its good that they made this film-its better than not having anything recent out there at all. Having someone to navigate for you if you are flying a plane makes it pretty safe, I think.

I have been a huge Amelia Earhart fan my whole life and I've waited to see this movie until I read a few books about her. After learning so much about the real woman I honestly could not stand to watch this film. My biggest pet peeve was the idea that G.P. GAVE her the Electra for her around the world flight, are you kidding me? She was approached by Purdue University to help lecture women about the importance of careers and it was AMELIA who worked out a deal with the university to fund the around the world flight. They basically just robbed her of an accomplishment to make George Putnam look good. Amelia always put work first and she was an advocate for advancing women's freedom and choices. She was also a social worker before becoming famous and it was one of the most important things t her. As for this huge love affair with George Putnam, they loved each other sure, but they also married because it was logical and she had no problems saying she wanted to put work first. I was appalled that the film could gloss over ALL of her accomplishments in favor of creating some fictitious soap opera romance. George was married when he met Amelia, no mention of that. There were so many historical inaccuracies that I could have overlooked if they had served a purpose. As for Hillary Swank she was the worst part of the film. She attempted a sweet, charming, quirky attitude and instead she came across sounding like an idiot. I really thought she was slow in some scenes. She was not nearly feminine enough to play Amelia and she lacked the paradoxical humble, yet confident quality that Amelia possessed. I kept noticing also that in some scenes she had the gap in her teeth and in others she did not. This movie was a huge disappointment.

You take one of histories richest characters and flatten out her personality, giving you the film "Amelia". So much potential in making a new movie about the life of Amelia, this film could have been terrific given the new information about her ill-fated flight and the evolution of computerized effects, but sadly Swank and Company offer us a meandering portrait of a fascinating person that cannot decide if it wishes to be a triangular love story or an historical account of the life of Amelia Earhart. Very disappointing was my first reaction while I waited for something other than the measured, even and unemotional acting by Swank, along with Gere's lame attempt to portray the swarmy, manipulative Mr Putnam. The only drama in this two hour film is contained in the last 5 minutes as Amelia tries to communicate with the Navy ship which was to assist the round-the-world flight with navigation, as her fuel supply is running out. Even that part could have been played with more intensity. The older films on this rich character do justice to her life and accomplishments, this movie does not. Oh, BTW, Swanks teeth look like a refrigerator showroom baring testament to the work of a fine orthodontist.