Titanic
1997
D: James Cameron
**********
Pros: Special Effects, Directing, Acting, Music
Cons: Story, Immature Romance, Hype, Inaccuracies
Today is the 25th anniversary of one of the most controversially popular movies ever made. Being a red-blooded man, I count myself among those who believe it to be overrated. Despite its overwrought praise, its emotionality and romance is shallow to the point where it inspired a great meme and one of the greatest reddit posts ever. What’s even more frustrating is that is the movie that James Cameron got a best picture for, not Terminator or Aliens, a perfect microcosm of the Academy’s blatant genre bias. It’s also worth-noting that 1997 had two far more deserving works: Amistad and Princess Mononoke. The first movie was about a boat, and the second one was an actually intelligent ersatz FernGully.
Enough ink has been spilled over why the romance in this movie is shallow (the aforementioned reddit post illustrates this beautifully), but the strange thing is that many people make Titanic out to be the new Citizen Kane, simply for its contemporary faddishness in the critical community. Still, it can be argued that the movie works in a barbaric, primal way that makes it somewhat like a female version of John Wick. The idea of reflecting on a past fling and what could have come from it, even in the face of a committed real life marriage, could be justified as an immature expression of female love in the same way that murdering scores of people for taking away token reminder of one’s dead wife is such for the male. Still, nobody pretends that John Wick is high art.
One thing that could sum up the movie’s problems is that, through some hackish knee-jerk, Cameron thought that movie about the Titanic needed to have villains, as illustrated by the caricature that is Billy Zane’s character. A better movie would not need to make the rival for the heroine’s affections a bad person to illustrate that she’s wrong for her. In fact, the movie would be more inspiring if the parties involved with the love triangle got over that and helped each other survive the disaster, even to the point of self-sacrifice. Heck, even a much maligned cartoon about wolves has better romance in which the two characters already know/like each other and the conflict is depicted as a valid conflict of interests.
The worst part of the movie is its villainization of William Murdock. While real-world evidence is ambiguous, the movie describes him as being a “practical man” who might accept a bribe for lifeboat privileged. It’s generally a pet peeve of mine for historic biopics to slander real-life heroes “for dramatic effect.” It’s especially frustrating that these are the type of movies that win Oscars.
Still, the movie is surprisingly watchable and well-executed to the point where I do believe that Cameron deserved his Best Director award. The visuals are epic and the movie features great CGI for the time. James Horner’s score is great, and I admit that I liked “My Heart Will Go On.”
I could argue that the movie might be a great story if taken as a slight tragic comedy from the point of view of Brock Lovett (Bill Paxton). The man dedicates so much effort to finding this historic diamond, bringing this crazy old woman (Gloria Stuart) and listening to her crazy, farcical story, only for her to dump the diamond whose location she claimed to have not known into the ocean. I particularly like movies in which the straight man resigns to laughter experiencing nothing but madness, as Lovett does in the alternate ending after listening to some crazy old lady's rationalization her craziness.
