Titanic
(1997)
Rated: PG-13
Runtime: 3 Hours and 14 Minutes
Reviewer: Dale
Grade: A+It may surprise anyone who knows me, but when I went into "Titanic", I was actually in a bad mood. I had been working all night and then a few friends and I decided to go see this movie on its opening night.
Unbeknownst to me, however, all but three of us had purchased tickets to "Scream 2". I had seen "Scream 2" and I didn't want to make the same mistake twice. I still haven't, and I count myself lucky. So there were three of us for "Titanic" and three for "Scream 2", which pissed me off because we had all gone there to watch something together. I mean, call me crazy, but that was what I thought. And then, on top of this, the only seats available to us were in the front row. Great. Three hours of staring straight up. My neck wasn't going to like this.
Needless to say, I was not a happy camper, not by any stretch of the imagination.
But within five minutes, I had forgotten all about that stuff.
Within five minutes, as I stared in awe at the wreckage of the Titanic as it lay on the ocean floor, trying to determine which footage was real and which was special effects, the movie had me. I was not even aware of it. So fully had I been enveloped that I scarcely realized I was watching a movie until I emerged, damp-cheeked, from the theater three hours later.
This movie was not just a movie. It was a time machine. And it still is. In three years I have seen this movie more times than I can count, and I cry each time. I am sucked in each time. I laugh at the jokes, I care about Jack and Rose, I feel sorry for Cal and feel malicious toward him at the same time. At some point, every time that I watch "Titanic", this movie ceases to be a movie for me. That is quite rare. I can't list all that many movies that have me that effortlessly spellbound. "American Beauty" is one. "Jaws" is another. But "Titanic" sucks me in and makes me feel more than any movie of the Nineties.
Why? Well, where do I start?
The structure. The structure of this movie is designed for maximum impact. It shows us the ship on the bottom of the sea, then it shows us on a computer monitor how it came apart, and then we see how the experience must have looked first-hand. We put a face on the people of Titanic. We see how exhilerating a sea voyage can be. We see two people from opposite classes fall in love, and we fall in love with them as they do so. Yes, we've seen people from opposite sides of the tracks fall in love many times before, but Cameron's approach makes it all seem new.
The effects. You will believe that the Titanic is sailing. You will watch the sinking and simply stare gape-mouthed at the horror of it, too enthralled to even wonder how they did it.
The editing. The transitions in this film are some of the finest I have seen. They are nothing less than beautiful. So are many of the camera angles. The sets and production design of this movie, likewise, are gorgeous to behold. It's even more astounding when you realize that Cameron invested at least two years of his life to get every detail just right. And it shows.
Every shot is packed with little details, with activity, with something new to notice every single viewing. There are a wealth of little touches in Titanic for the repeat viewer to discover and savor.
The music. It is haunting and magnificent: rousing when needed, suspenseful when demanded.
The acting. Kate Winslet invests a great vitality and a huge amount of energy in this role. She IS Rose DeWitt Bukator. She is not the most beautiful woman ever to grace the silver screen, but she doesn't need to be. It is her fire, her spunk that makes us care, that grips us and drags us along. This is not just another little spoiled rich girl, we can see why Jack is willing to go so far for her.
And DiCaprio. Wow. He is a revelation in this film. He has the charm and smooth, rough around the edges finesse of a young Paul Newman here. I don't like him in many other movies (although you owe it to yourself to see him sink into the retarded role in the movie "What's Eating Gilbert Grape") but that doesn't stop me from commending him here. He has a prescence here that carries us over any rough patches the movie might have (although I think most of those rough patches that others bring up are just tiny details they have blown out of proportion: I could pick "L.A. Confidential" apart just as easily if I wanted to, and I may want to someday, you have been warned) and any lines of dialogue that might be iffy.
He deserved an Oscar for this performance, simply because I doubt we will ever see him this good again. And he was lightyears better than Nicholson, who just played a slight variation on the same character he has been playing for thirty years in "As Good as it Gets".
Simply put: no other characters of the Nineties made me care about them as much as Jack and Rose. No other spectacle of the Nineties conveyed as much horror as the sinking of the Titanic. No other spectacle was quite as spectacular as seeing Titanic sail, the closest thing we will ever get to seeing it for real. And, in my own opinion, no other scene in film history was as heart-breakingly romantic as the "I'm Flying" scene.
I stand by that opinion, and shall defend it to my dying day. Billy Zane was an asshole, yes, but not without realistic touches. He was a three-dimensional character. He just wanted the woman he loved to love him back and he wanted to save his own ass. What is so unrealistic about that? He could have been better. But he also might have been worse.
Imagine if you will Charlie Sheen as Cal Hockley. Now shut up. You may not agree with me.
But I don't really care. I love this movie, truly love it. It touches my heart and makes me feel happy and sad and giddy and inspired. Maybe it doesn't do the same for you. Maybe it does.
Either way, I can only speak for what it does for me. As for me, it shows me what I think true love could be like and it shows me what real loss is. It transports me back to a time that
I will never experience and lets me see, perhaps, just a little of what this time was like. It affects me, in short, and it does so masterfully.
At the very least, it beats the hell out of "Scream 2".