Hilary Swank is right to play Amelia Earhart. Richard Gere isn't a bad choice to appear as her husband. They're set loose on lush locations and given great clothes to wear.

So why, then, isn't "Amelia" more satisfying?

Like a high school theme paper, it hits the high points but never lets Swank have the quiet moments that would define Earhart's character. This is very much Cliffs Notes screenwriting, complete with lines that sound like they were cobbed from Bartlett's Familiar Quotations.

Ron Bass and Anna Hamilton Phelan have excellent credits as writers but, somehow, someone must have edited out the good stuff. Their screenplay plays out like "English Patient"-lite.

Director Mira Nair tries her best to bathe it all in a Ralph Lauren glow but, sometimes, that light is blinding. When Swank is barnstorming around the country, we wonder if she's really a driven woman or the product of a good PR campaign.

Gere -- as her Svengali and lover -- is more P.T. Barnum than publisher. He plots each mile in her trek to become the first woman pilot to cross the Atlantic. Maps (and mileage totals) provide some sense of location but we're not sure if Earhart is as committed as those behind her.

Ewan McGregor turns up as Gene Vidal, a friend and confidant. He's accused of being a lover, too, but Nair never plays out that scenario. Instead, there are incriminating letters -- and more voiceovers than a Ken Burns documentary. If the relationship did exist, why not explore it. If not, why not fill in some of the blanks?

When Earhart makes her last flight, you can sense the doom that hangs in the air. There's a bit of finger-pointing (she had a navigator with more than a few problems) and a radio technician who's hardly attentive. Still, what's the lesson we learn from all this?

Was Earhart more headline-grabber than we thought? Was her personal life filled with turmoil? Did fans view her as just another celebrity?

It's never clear. Instead, we get a respectful performance from Swank (who seems to switch between fake and real teeth throughout), a suitable one from Gere and a whole lot of lines that sound like they were written to be used in talk show appearances.

"Amelia" is noble, not notable. Considering the people involved, it could have been so much more.

Rated PG for some adult situations.

On a scale of four stars, "Amelia" gets:

2 stars