Titanic (1997 film)

Titanic
Directed by	James Cameron
Produced by	Jon Landau James Cameron
Written by	James Cameron
Starring	Leonardo DiCaprio Kate Winslet Billy Zane Frances Fisher Victor Garber Kathy Bates Gloria Stuart Bill Paxton Danny Nucci
Music by	James Horner
Cinematography	Russell Carpenter
Editing by	Conrad Buff IV James Cameron Richard A. Harris
Distributed by	-International- 20th Century Fox -USA/Canada- Paramount Pictures
Release date(s)	October 31, 1997 (premiere at Tokyo IFF) December 19, 1997 (U.S.), (AUS) January 23, 1998 (U.K.)
Running time	194 min.
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	US$200,000,000[1]
Gross revenue	US$1,845,034,188 (worldwide)
Official website
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Titanic is a 1997 American romance film directed, written, produced and edited by James Cameron about the sinking of the RMS Titanic. It stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet as Jack Dawson and Rose DeWitt Bukater, two members of different social classes who fall in love aboard the ill-fated 1912 maiden voyage of the ship. The main characters and the central love story are fictional, but some supporting characters (such as members of the ship's crew) are based on real historical figures. Gloria Stuart plays the elderly Rose, who narrates the film in a modern day framing device.

Production of the film began in 1995, when Cameron shot footage of the real wreck of the RMS Titanic. He envisioned the love story as a means to engage the audience with the real life tragedy. Shooting took place at the Akademik Mstislav Keldysh for the modern scenes, and a reconstruction of the ship was built at Playas de Rosarito. Cameron also used scale models and computer-generated imagery to recreate the sinking of the ship. Titanic became the most expensive film yet made in unadjusted dollars, costing approximately US$200 million with funding from Paramount Pictures and 20th Century Fox.

Originally slated to be released on July 2, 1997, post-production delays pushed back the film's release date to December 19, 1997. After word broke out that Titanic's release date was pushed back, the press believed that Titanic would fail, causing the downfall of Fox and Paramount. Despite low expectations, the film was both a critical and commercial success, tying with All About Eve for the most Academy Award nominations, at 14. The film won 11, including the Academy Award for Best Picture, and became the highest grossing film of all time, with a total worldwide gross of approximately $1.8 billion.

Plot

In 1996, treasure hunter Brock Lovett and his team explore the wreck of the RMS Titanic searching for a necklace set with a valuable blue diamond called the Heart of the Ocean. They discover a drawing of a young woman reclining nude, wearing the Heart of the Ocean, dated the day the Titanic sank. News of this drawing on television attracts the interest of the woman in question, Rose Dawson Calvert, now nearly 101, who informs Lovett that she is the nude woman in the drawing. She and her granddaughter Lizzy visit Lovett on his ship, and she recalls her memories as 17-year-old Rose DeWitt Bukater aboard the Titanic. In 1912, young Rose boards the departing ship with the upper-class passengers, her mother, Ruth DeWitt Bukater, and her fiancé, Caledon Hockley. Also on board is Margaret "Molly" Brown, who makes the acquaintance of Rose's party. Distraught and frustrated with her engagement to Cal and her controlled life, Rose attempts to commit suicide by jumping from the stern, but a drifter and artist named Jack Dawson intervenes. Initially Calvert, his friends and the sailors, overhearing Rose's screams, believe the penniless Jack attempted to rape her. She explains Jack saved her life, covering up her suicide attempt by explaining she slipped after trying to see the propellers. They strike up a tentative friendship as he shares stories of his adventures traveling and sketching, and their bond deepens when they leave a first-class formal dinner for a much livelier gathering in third-class. During this party, she impresses several men by standing en pointe without any special shoes and then collapses in Jack's arms.

Cal is informed of her partying in the steerage and forbids Rose to meet Jack again. Rose's mother also commands her to give up Jack and save her engagement to Cal in order to ensure their financial welfare. Eventually, Jack confronts Rose alone, but she is inclined to ignore their growing affection because of her engagement and responsibilities. However, after witnessing a woman encouraging her seven year old daughter to behave like a 'proper lady' at tea, Rose later changes her mind and decides to offer her heart to Jack in a forbidden romance. As a sign of her affection, she asks him to sketch her nude wearing only the Heart of the Ocean, which she had previously been offered as an engagement present by Cal.

Afterwards, the two run away from Hockley's manservant, Spicer Lovejoy, and they go below decks to the cargo hold. They enter William Carter's Renault traveling car and have sex, before escaping up to the ship's forward well deck. Rose decides that when they arrive at New York, she will leave the ship with Jack. They then witness the ship's collision with an iceberg, which critically damages it. Meanwhile, Cal discovers Rose's nude drawing and her taunting note in his safe. He plots revenge, deciding to frame Jack for stealing the Heart of the Ocean, and bribes the master-at-arms to handcuff and lock Jack in his office. Although Rose is at first indecisive, she later runs away from Cal, risking her chances of getting on a lifeboat with her mother, in order to find and rescue Jack.

Rose manages to free Jack with a fire axe, and finds that the third-class passengers are trapped below decks. Frustrated, Jack breaks through a gate, allowing Rose and others to make their way to the boat deck. Cal and Jack, though enemies, both want Rose safe and so they manage to persuade Rose to board a lifeboat. But after realizing that she cannot leave Jack, Rose jumps back on the ship and reunites with Jack in the ship's first class staircase. Infuriated, Cal takes Lovejoy's pistol and chases Jack and Rose down the decks and into the first class dining saloon. After running out of ammunition, he angrily shouts at them saying that he hopes "they enjoy their time together" and realizes that he has unintentionally left the diamond in the pocket of an overcoat that Rose is wearing. Hockley returns to the boat deck and gets aboard Collapsible A by pretending to look after an abandoned child. This is one of only two lifeboats remaining on the ship. Although Jack and Rose manage to avoid Cal's fury, they find that the lifeboats are gone. With no other options, they decide to head aft and stay on the ship for as long as possible before it sinks completely. Eventually, the ship breaks in half and begins its final descent, washing everyone into the freezing Atlantic waters. Jack and Rose are separated under the water but shortly reunite. Around them, well over a thousand people are dying painfully from hypothermia.

Meanwhile, in Lifeboat 6, Molly Brown tries to go convince Quartermaster Robert Hichens to go back and rescue people, as there is plenty of room, but he refuses, knowing that there is not enough room for all of them and that all the boats will be swamped. Jack manages to grab hold of a wall paneling, and gets Rose to lie on it. While lying on the wall paneling, Jack makes Rose promise that, whatever happens, she must get out alive. When Fifth Officer Harold Lowe returns with an empty Lifeboat 14 to rescue several people from the water, Rose tries to wake Jack, but then realizes that he has died in the freezing water. Upon this realization, she begins to lose hope and wants to stay there to die with Jack, but remembers her promise. She does her best to call out to Lowe, but her voice is hoarse and very quiet and he does not hear her and rows away. Still remembering her promise to "never let go," Rose manages to unclasp Jack's frozen hand from her own, letting his body disappear into the sea. Throwing herself into the water, Rose takes a whistle from a dead Chief Officer Henry Wilde and blows it, and is heard. She is pulled to safety, joining the five other survivors from the water, and is taken on board the rescue ship RMS Carpathia. On the Carpathia's deck, Rose notices Cal coming down searching for her desperately. When he turns in her direction, she, who has a blanket wrapped around her, turns away, not letting him see her at all or revealing herself to him. This is the last time she ever sees Hockley. Upon arrival in New York City, Rose registers her name as Rose Dawson and presumably starts a life on her own. Through the elderly Rose, we learn that Cal went on to marry another woman, and later committed suicide as a result of business losses in the Great Depression. The subsequent story of Rose's mother, who escaped on a lifeboat and was presumably rescued, is not told.

After completing her story, the elderly Rose goes alone to the stern of Lovett's ship. After she steps onto the railing, it is revealed that she still has the Heart of the Ocean in her possession. She then drops the diamond into the water, sending it to join the remains of the single most important event of her life. She kept every promise she had made to Jack, and did everything they ever talked about doing. Rose lies in her bed, next to photographs of her life's achievements, as the shot pans across her into darkness. The film ends with a vision of young Rose reuniting with Jack at the Grand Staircase, surrounded by those who perished with Jack on the ship. They kiss and embrace, and all the people on the staircase start to applaud with open arms. It is left up to the viewer to decide the meaning of the ending, specifically whether if Rose is only dreaming or if it is truly a vision of Rose reuniting with her lover in the afterlife.

Production

James Cameron was fascinated by shipwrecks, including the RMS Titanic, and wrote a treatment for a film.^[3] He described the sinking of the RMS Titanic: as "like a great novel that really happened". Yet, over time he felt that the event had become a mere morality tale, and described making the film as putting the audience in an experience of living history. Cameron described a love story as the most engaging part of a story. As the likeable Jack and Rose had their love blossom and eventually destroyed, the audience would mourn the loss. Lastly, Cameron created a modern framing of the romance with an elderly Rose, making the history palpable and poignant.^[2] The treasure hunter Brock Lovett is meant to represent those who never connected with the human element of the tragedy.^[4] Cameron wanted to honor the people who died during the sinking, and he spent six months fully researching what happened, creating a timeline of all the Titanic's crew and passengers.^[2]

He met with 20th Century Fox, and convinced them to make a film based on the publicity afforded by shooting the wreck itself^[3] and organized a dive to the wreck of the Titanic over two years.^[2] The crew shot in the Atlantic Ocean twelve times in 1995, shooting during eleven of those occasions, and actually spent more time with the ship than its passengers. Afterwards, Cameron began writing a screenplay.^[3] Harland and Wolff, the RMS Titanic's builders, opened their private archives to the crew, sharing blueprints that were thought lost. For the ship's interiors, production designer Peter Lamont's team looked for artifacts from the era, though the newness of the ship meant every prop had to be made from scratch.^[5] Fox acquired forty acres of waterfront south of Playas de Rosarito, and building of a new studio began on May 31, 1996. A seventeen million gallon tank was built for the exterior of the reconstructed ship, providing 270 degrees of ocean view. The ship was built to full scale, but Lamont removed redundant sections on the superstructure and forward well deck for the ship to fit in the tank, with the remaining sections filled with digital models. The lifeboats and funnels were shrunk by ten percent. The boat deck and A-deck were working sets, but the rest of the ship was just steel plating. Within was a fifty-foot lifting platform for the ship to tilt during the sinking sequences. Towering above was a 162 feet (49 m) tall tower crane on 600 feet (180 m) of railtrack, acting as a combined construction, lighting and camera platform.^[4] After shooting the sinking scenes, the ship was then dismantled and sold for scrap metal to cover budgetary costs.^[6]

Filming

The modern day scenes were shot on the Akademik Mstislav Keldysh in July 1996.^[4] It was during this shoot that someone sprinkled phencyclidine into the crew's dinner, affecting many including Cameron, and sending several dozen of them to the hospital. The person behind the prank was never caught.^[7][8] Principal photography for Titanic began in September 1996 at the newly-built Fox Baja Studios.^[4] The shot scenes on the poop deck was built on a hinge which could rise from zero to ninety degrees in a few seconds as the ship's stern rose during sinking.^[9] For the safety of the stuntmen, many props were made of foam rubber.^[10] By November 15, they were shooting the boarding scenes.^[9] Cameron chose to build his RMS Titanic on the starboard side as study of weather data showed prevailing north-to-south wind that blew the funnel smoke aft. This posed a problem for shooting the ship's departure from Southampton, as it was docked on its port side. Writing on props and costumes had to be reversed, and if someone walked to their right in the script, they had to walk left. In post-production, the film was flipped to the correct direction.^[11]

Filming Titanic was an arduous experience for all involved. The schedule was intended to last 138 days but grew to 160 — twenty days shy of six months. Many cast members came down with colds, flu or kidney infections after spending hours in cold water, including Kate Winslet. Several left and three stuntmen broke their bones, but the Screen Actors Guild decided, following an investigation, that nothing was inherently unsafe about the set. Cameron never apologized for running his sets like a military campaign, although he admitted, "I'm demanding, and I'm demanding on my crew. In terms of being kind of militaresque, I think there's an element of that in dealing with thousands of extras and big logistics and keeping people safe. I think you have to have a fairly strict methodology in dealing with a large number of people." After almost drowning, chipping an elbow bone and getting the flu, Winslet decided she would not work with Cameron again unless she earned "a lot of money".^[7]

Effects

An enclosed five million gallon tank was used for sinking interiors, in which the entire set could be tilted into the water. To sink the Grand Staircase, ninety thousand gallons of water were dumped into the set as it was lowered into the tank. Unexpectedly, the waterfall ripped the staircase from its steel-reinforced foundations, though no one was hurt. The 744-foot (227 m) long exterior of the RMS Titanic had its first half lowered into the tank, but being the heaviest part of the ship meant it acted as a shock absorber against the water. To get the set into the water, Cameron had much of the set emptied and even smashed some of the promenade windows himself. After submerging the Dining Saloon, three days were spent shooting Lovett's ROV traversing the wreck in the present.^[4] The post-sinking scenes in the freezing Atlantic were shot in a 350,000 gallon tank,^[12] where the frozen corpses were created by applying a powder on actors that crystallized when exposed to water, and wax was coated on hair and clothes.^[5]

Cameron wanted to push the boundary of special effects with his film, and enlisted Digital Domain to continue the breakthroughs on digital technology the director pioneered on The Abyss and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Previous films about the RMS Titanic shot water in slow motion, which did not look wholly convincing.^[13] He encouraged them to shoot their 45-foot (14 m) long miniature of the ship as if "we're making a commercial for the White Star Line."^[14] Afterward, digital water and smoke were added, as were extras captured on a motion capture stage. Visual effects supervisor Rob Legato scanned the faces of many actors, including himself and his children, for the digital extras and stuntmen. There was also a 65-foot (20 m) long model of the ship's stern that could break in two repeatedly, the only miniature to be used in water.^[13] For scenes set in the ship's engines, footage of the SS Jeremiah O'Brien's engines were composited with miniature support frames and actors shot against greenscreen.^[15] To save money, the First Class Lounge was a miniature set incorporated into a greenscreen backdrop.^[16]

Editing

During the first assembly cut, Cameron had a major problem with the original ending. Cameron felt at this point the audience no longer cared about Brock Lovett and cut his resolution out. In this ending, Brock sees Old Rose preparing to drop the necklace into the ocean and assumes she is going to jump. After he and Lizzy stop her, she reveals that she had the Heart of the Ocean diamond all along, but never sold it for money, as it reminded her of Cal too much. She tells him that life is priceless and throws the diamond into the ocean, after allowing him to hold the necklace. Accepting that treasure is worthless, he starts to laugh at his stupidity. Brock then falls for Lizzy, and Rose goes back to sleep, completing the ending shown in the film. Cameron did not want to disrupt the emotional mood after the Titanic's sinking, feeling audiences no longer cared for Lovett's story after watching the sinking sequence.^[17]

During his first test screening, Cameron felt that the preview audience liked the film, but disliked a fight scene between Jack and Lovejoy (which took place after Jack and Rose escape into the flooded dining saloon). The scene was written to give the film more suspense, but the test audiences stated it would be unrealistic to risk one's life for wealth. In this scene, Cal (falsely) offers to give Lovejoy, his valet, the Heart of the Ocean if he can kill Jack and Rose. Lovejoy goes after the pair in the sinking First Class dining room. Just as they are about to escape him, Lovejoy notices Rose's hand slap the water as it slips off the table behind which she is hiding. In revenge for framing him for the "theft" of the necklace, Jack attacks him and smashes his head against a glass window, explaining the gash on Lovejoy's head. As with many other scenes, Cameron cut the scene for time constraints, pacing, and disapproval from test screenings.^[18]

Cast

Main article: List of characters in Titanic (1997 film)

Fictional characters

• Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson: A penniless artist who travels the world, Jack wins tickets to the RMS Titanic in a card game. He is attracted to Rose's beauty and convinces her out of an attempted suicide. His saving of her life brings him into first-class society for a night, and he shows her a carefree way of life of which she had often fantasized but never realized of doing. Billy Crudup and Stephen Dorff were considered for the role of Jack.^[19][20]
  • Kate Winslet as Rose DeWitt Bukater: A first-class socialite, seventeen-year-old Rose is forced to become engaged to Caledon Hockley so she and her mother can maintain their high status after the death of her father. Feeling trapped, Rose becomes suicidal, but she soon discovers a completely new lease on life when she meets Jack Dawson. Cameron asked Claire Danes to play the part, but she was exhausted after Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet which also starred DiCaprio, and she found Titanic too similar.^[21]
    • Billy Zane as Caledon "Cal" Nathan Hockley: The heir to an enormous steel fortune and the quintessential arrogant and snobbish first-class man. Rose's fiancé Cal becomes increasingly embarrassed, jealous, and cruel over Rose's relationship with Jack. He gives Rose the famous "Heart of the Ocean" diamond as a reminder of his feelings for her, and then asks her to "open her heart to him". Cal shoots himself in the mouth in 1929 after the stock market crash hit his interests hard.
    • Frances Fisher as Ruth DeWitt Bukater: Rose's widowed mother, who is marrying her off to ensure their high-class status. She loves her daughter but believes marriage to Cal is the right thing to do. The epitome of the shallowness and hypocrisies of high-class society, she scorns Jack, even though he saved her daughter's life.
    • Danny Nucci as Fabrizio De Rossi: Jack's Italian best friend who comes aboard the RMS Titanic after winning a card game. Fabrizio is killed during the sinking when one of the ship's funnels collapses and crushes him while he tries to swim away.
    • Jason Barry as Tommy Ryan: An Irish third-class passenger who befriends Jack and Fabrizio. He also makes a comment to Jack about his unlikely chance to get next to Rose. Tommy is shot dead by First Officer Murdoch after being pushed and mistaken for attempting to rush into a lifeboat.
    • David Warner as Spicer Lovejoy: An ex-Pinkerton constable, Lovejoy is Cal's English valet and bodyguard who keeps an eye on Rose and is suspicious of the circumstances of Jack's rescue of her. According to Rose, Lovejoy was hired by Cal's father to "keep an eye on his little boy." He accompanies Cal, Rose and Ruth on the RMS Titanic and tells the porters where to put their luggage. He dies during the sinking and is last seen clinging onto the deck rail for dear life as the ship splits apart beneath him.
    • Bill Paxton as Brock Lovett: A treasure hunter looking for the "Heart of the Ocean" in the wreck of the RMS Titanic in the present. Time and funding to his expedition is running out.
    • Gloria Stuart plays the 100-year old Rose Calvert: She comes to give Lovett information regarding the "Heart of the Ocean", after he discovers a nude drawing of her in the wreck of the RMS Titanic. She narrates the story of her time aboard the ship, mentioning Jack for the first time since.
    • Suzy Amis as Lizzy Calvert: Rose's granddaughter, who takes care of her, and accompanies her to the ship on her visit to Lovett. In a deleted scene of the film, she angrily confronts Lovett and warns him not to browbeat Rose.
    • Lewis Abernathy as Lewis Bodine: Lovett's friend, who expresses doubt at first whether the old Rose is telling the truth. He also explains to Rose, with little regard for sensitivity, how the RMS Titanic sank with a 3-D computer simulation.

    Historical characters

    • Kathy Bates as Margaret Brown: Brown is depicted as being frowned upon by other first-class women, including Ruth, as "new money" due to her sudden wealth. She is friendly to Jack and gives him a tuxedo (which she bought for her son) when he is invited to dinner in the first-class dining saloon.
    • Victor Garber as Thomas Andrews, Jr.: The ship's designer, Andrews is portrayed as a very nice and pleasant man who is somewhat modest about his grand achievement. After the collision, he struggles to comprehend that his "unsinkable" ship is doomed with not enough lifeboats for half the people on board. He is depicted during the sinking of the ship as standing next to the clock in the first class smoking room, lamenting his failure to build a strong and safe ship. He gives Rose a life jacket so she doesn't drown in the icy water, and is last seen looking at his watch and adjusting the clock in the same room, accepting his fate.
    • Bernard Hill as Captain Edward John Smith: The film depicts the captain of the RMS Titanic as retiring to his quarters before the ship hits the iceberg. He retreats into the wheelhouse as the ship sinks, dying when the icy water bursts through the windows.
    • Jonathan Hyde as Joseph Bruce Ismay: Ismay is portrayed as an ignorant first-class rich man, who does not know who Sigmund Freud is. He uses his position as White Star Line chairman to influence Captain Smith to go faster with the prospect of an earlier arrival in New York and favourable press attention. He cowardly takes the opportunity to get into a lifeboat, and looks back, guilt-stricken, as his ship sinks.
    • Eric Braeden as Colonel John Jacob Astor: A first-class passenger whom Rose calls the richest man on the ship. The film depicts Astor and his 19-year-old wife Madeleine as being introduced to Jack by Rose in the first-class dining saloon. He is presumably drowned when the Grand Staircase glass dome implodes and tons of water surge in, clutching onto a post.
    • Bernard Fox as Colonel Archibald Gracie: The film depicts Gracie making a comment to Cal that "women and machinery don't mix," and congratulating Jack for saving Rose from committing suicide.
    • Michael Ensign as Benjamin Guggenheim: A mining tycoon traveling in first class. He openly shows off his French mistress Madame Aubart to his fellow passengers while his family wait for him back home. Before his death, he utters the famous words, "We are dressed in our best and are prepared to go down as gentlemen," before asking for a final glass of brandy.
    • Jonathan Evans-Jones as Wallace Hartley: The ship's bandmaster who plays uplifting music with his colleagues on the boat deck as the ship sinks, culminating in a final, emotional performance of Nearer, My God, to Thee. His final words are "Gentlemen. It has been a privilege playing with you tonight."
    • Ewan Stewart as First Officer William Murdoch: The film's most controversial depiction, Murdoch shoots and kills men who try to enter a lifeboat under Captain Smith's order of women and children first, before committing suicide out of guilt. When Murdoch's nephew Scott saw the film, he objected to his uncle's portrayal as damaging to Murdoch's heroic reputation, considering that he did try to get a number of passengers off.^[22] A few months later, Fox Vice-president Scott Neeson went to Dalbeattie, where Murdoch lived, to deliver a personal apology, and also presented a £5000 donation to Dalbeattie High School to boost the school's William Murdoch Memorial Prize.^[23] Cameron apologized on the DVD commentary, but noted that there were officers who fired gunshots to follow the "women and children first" policy.^[24]
      • Jonathan Phillips as Second Officer Charles Lightoller: The ship's only senior officer who survived the sinking. The film depicts Lightoller arguing with Captain Smith that it would be difficult to see the icebergs with no breaking water.
      • Ioan Gruffudd as Fifth Officer Harold Lowe: The only ship's officer who led a lifeboat to retrieve survivors of the sinking. The film depicts Lowe rescuing Rose from the freezing ocean after finding her floating on a door.
      • Edward Fletcher as Sixth Officer James Moody: The ship's only junior officer who died in the sinking. The film depicts Moody admitting Jack and Fabrizio onto the ship only moments before it departs from Southampton, and informs First Officer Murdoch about the iceberg.

      Cameos

      Several crew members of the Akademik Mstislav Keldysh appear in the film, including Anatoly Sagalevich, creator and pilot of the Mir submersibles.^[4] Anders Falk, who filmed a documentary about the film's sets for the Titanic Historical Society, cameoed in the film as a Swedish immigrant who Jack Dawson meets when he enters his cabin, and Ed and Karen Kamuda, then President and Vice President of the Society, were extras on the film.^[25]

      Release

      Paramount Pictures and 20th Century Fox financed Titanic, and expected James Cameron to complete the film for a release on July 2, 1997. With production delays, Paramount pushed back the release date to December 19, 1997.^[26] The film premiered on November 1, 1997, at the Tokyo International Film Festival,^[27] where reaction was described as "tepid" by the New York Times.^[28]

      Box office

      The film received steady attendance after opening in North America on Friday, December 19, 1997. By Sunday that same weekend, theaters were beginning to sell out. The film debuted with $28,638,131. By New Year's Day, Titanic had increased in popularity and theaters continued selling out. After it was released, it stayed at #1 for 15 consecutive weeks in the U.S. box office. By March 1998, it was the first film to earn more than $1 billion worldwide.^[29] The movie stayed in theaters for over eight months. Some theaters in Australia and South Africa ran it for longer than a year.

      Titanic holds the record for the highest-grossing film of all time in North America, with $600 million. The previous North American record holder, Star Wars (another 20th Century Fox film), earned a total of $461 million.^[30] Adjusted for inflation, Titanic is in sixth place.^[31] The film also holds the record as the highest-grossing movie of all time worldwide with $1.8 billion.^[32] The second-place worldwide holder, Return of the King, is over $700 million short of Titanic's record.

      Critical reaction

      The film garnered mostly positive reviews from critics. It is a "Certified Fresh" film on Rotten Tomatoes, with 82% overall approval from critics.^[33] The film received a 74/100 metascore on Metacritic, classified as a generally favorable reviewed film.^[34]

      Roger Ebert wrote, "It is flawlessly crafted, intelligently constructed, strongly acted, and spellbinding.... Movies like this are not merely difficult to make at all, but almost impossible to make well. The technical difficulties are so daunting that it's a wonder when the filmmakers are also able to bring the drama and history into proportion. I found myself convinced by both the story and the sad saga."^[35] It was one of his top ten films of 1997.^[36]

      James Berardinelli explains, "Meticulous in detail, yet vast in scope and intent, Titanic is the kind of epic motion picture event that has become a rarity. You don't just watch Titanic, you experience it."^[37] It is his second best movie of 1997.^[38]

      Some reviewers felt that the story and dialogue were weak, while the visuals were spectacular. Kenneth Turan's review in the Los Angeles Times was particularly scathing. Dismissing the emotive elements, he says, "What really brings on the tears is Cameron's insistence that writing this kind of movie is within his abilities. Not only is it not, it is not even close."^[39] Barbara Shulgasser of San Francisco Examiner gave Titanic one star out of four, citing a friend as saying, "The number of times in this unbelievably badly-written script that the two [lead characters] refer to each other by name was an indication of just how dramatically the script lacked anything more interesting for the actors to say."^[40]

      Titanic suffered backlash from many after its release. In 2003, the film topped a poll of "Best Film Endings",^[41] and yet it also topped a poll by The Film programme as "the worst movie of all time".^[42] Parodies and spoofs abounded and were circulated around the Internet, often inspiring passionate responses from fans of various opinions of the film.^[43]

      Since its release, Titanic has appeared on the AFI's award-winning 100 Years.... So far, it has ranked on the following five lists:

      AFI's 100 Years... 100	Rank	Notes
      Thrills	25	A list of the top 100 thrilling movies in American cinema compiled in 2001.
      Passions	37	A list of the top 100 love stories in American cinema, compiled in 2002.
      Songs	14	A list of the top 100 songs in American cinema, compiled in 2004. Titanic ranked 14th for Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On."
      Movie quotes	100	A list of the top 100 movie quotations in American cinema, compiled in 2005. Titanic ranked 100th for Jack Dawson's (Leonardo DiCaprio) yell of, "I'm the king of the world!"
      Movies	83	A 2007 (10th anniversary) edition of 1997's list of the 100 best movies of the past century. Titanic was not eligible when the original list was released.

      Awards

      Titanic began its awards sweep starting with the Golden Globes, winning four, including Best Motion Picture (Drama), Best Director, Best Original Score, and Best Song.^[44] Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Gloria Stuart, and James Cameron's screenplay were also nominees but lost.^[45] It won the ACE "Eddie" Award, ASC Award, Art Directors Guild Award, Cinema Audio Society Award, Screen Actors Guild Awards, (Best Supporting Actress Gloria Stuart), The Directors Guild of America Award, and Broadcast Film Critics Association Award (Best Director James Cameron), and The Producer Guild of America Awards. It was also nominated for ten BAFTA awards, including Best Film and Director.

      It tied All About Eve for having the most Oscar nominations in history, with 14. It won Best Picture and Best Director. It also picked up Best Costume Design, Best Visual Effects, Best Sound Mixing, Best Sound Editing, Best Original Score, Best Film Editing, Best Original Song, Best Art Direction, and Best Cinematography. Kate Winslet, Gloria Stuart and the make-up artists were the three nominees that failed to win. James Cameron's original screenplay and Leonardo DiCaprio were not nominees. ^[46] It was the second movie to win eleven Academy Awards, after Ben-Hur. Return of the King would also match this record in 2004, with its 11 wins from 11 nominations.

      The ending credits' song also won the Grammy Awards for Best Song Written Specifically for a Motion Picture or for Television. The film also won Best Male Performance for Leonardo DiCaprio and Best Movie at the MTV Movie Awards. The film was voted as Best Film at the People's Choice Awards. It won various awards outside the United States, including the Awards of the Japanese Academy as the Best Foreign Film of the Year. Titanic eventually won nearly 90 awards and had an additional 47 nominations from various award-giving bodies around the world.^[47]

      Home video

      Titanic was first released to DVD on July 31, 1999 in a widescreen-only (non-anamorphic) single disc edition with no special features other than a theatrical trailer. Cameron stated at the time that he intended to release a special edition with extra features later. This release became the best-selling DVD of 1999 and early 2000, becoming the first DVD ever to sell 1 million copies.

      Six years after the original DVD release, on October 25, 2005,^[48] a special edition release finally occurred with a three-disc set marketed as Special Collector's Edition in North America and as the Ultimate Edition in Japan. The release included an anamorphic widescreen presentation of the film divided onto two discs, with 6.1 channel surround sound. The supplements included 29 deleted scenes, an alternate ending, a faux 1912-style newsreel, a crew tribute/gag reel, and other features. Ed Marsh was originally commissioned to shoot and edit a two-hour retrospective documentary, and had completed it when Cameron decided to drop it from the DVD set.

      An international two and four-disc set followed on November 7, 2005.^[49] The two-disc edition was marketed as the Special Edition, and featured the first two discs of the three-disc set, only PAL enabled. A four-disc edition, marketed as the Deluxe Collector's Edition, was also released on November 7, 2005.^[50] This set included all of the material of the three-disc edition, with the fourth disc containing the HBO special Heart of the Ocean, spoofs and parodies (available as Easter eggs in the Region 1 edition), and a gallery of trailers and TV spots, some never before seen. There is no official reason for why this set, alongside the two and five-disc set, have not being released in North America. The four-disc edition was released in Mexico for Region 4 on December 21, 2005.

      Image:Titanic5dvd.jpg

      The inside contents of the 5-Disc collector's set

      Available only in the UK, a limited five-disc set of the film, under the title Deluxe Limited Edition, was released with only 10,000 copies manufactured. The fifth disc contains James Cameron's documentary Ghosts of the Abyss. Unlike the individual release of Ghosts of the Abyss, which contained two discs, only the first disc was included in the set. Each set is numbered, for buyers to easily tell the difference between an authentic copy and a bootleg copy. The set was exclusive to HMV and Virgin Megastores, but were only available in December 2005. The 10,000 sets produced were split, 5,000 to each store chain. Also, the sets produced in HMV had a blue casing, as the three and four disc sets has, but the sets produced in VM had a black casing, as shown in the picture.

      On September 1, 2007 it was announced that a two-disc tenth anniversary edition would be released by Paramount Pictures on November 20, 2007,^[51] but turned out to be a repackage of the first two discs from the 2005 release.^[52]

      Soundtrack

      Main article: Titanic (soundtrack)

      • "My Heart Will Go On" (performed by Céline Dion)

        Image:MyHeartWillGoOnSample.ogg

        Written by James Horner and Will Jennings, this ballad won four Grammy Awards and became known for its powerful vocal range. It reached number-one in more than twenty-five countries.

      • Problems playing the files? See media help.

      The soundtrack CD for Titanic was composed by James Horner and sold more than twenty-seven million copies, notable because it included only one pop song with lyrics. The soundtrack includes performances from the Norwegian singer Sissel Kyrkjebø, and the Canadian singer Céline Dion. It became a worldwide success, and led to the release of a second volume that contained a mixture of previously unreleased soundtrack recordings with newly-recorded performances of some of the songs in the film, including one track recorded by Enya's sister, Máire Brennan of the Irish band Clannad. "Hymn to the Sea" features Bad Haggis's Eric Rigler on the uilleann pipes and whistles.

      James Horner wrote the song "My Heart Will Go On" in secret with Will Jennings because Cameron did not want any songs with singing in the film. Dion agreed to record a demo with the persuasion of her husband René Angélil. Horner waited until Cameron was in an appropriate mood before presenting him with the song. After playing it several times, Cameron declared its approval, although worried that he would have been criticized for "going commercial at the end of the movie".^[53] It eventually won the 1997 Academy Award for Best Original Song, meaning that without the inclusion of the song, the movie would not have tied the record for most Oscar nominations or Oscars won.

      References

      • Ed W. Marsh (1998). James Cameron's Titanic. London: Boxtree. ISBN 0-7522-2404-2. 
      1. ^ "Box office statistics for Titanic (1997)". BoxOfficeMojo.com. Retrieved October 15, 2006.
      2. ^ ^{a b c d} Marsh, p.v-xiii
      3. ^ ^{a b c}
      4. ^ ^{a b c d e f}
      5. ^ ^{a b} Marsh, p.36-8
      6. ^ Quiz at the past international DVD website
      7. ^ ^{a b} Andrew Gumbel. "Lights, cameras, blockbuster: The return of James Cameron", The Independent, 2007-01-11. Retrieved on 2008-02-05. 
      8. ^ Jon Landau, Kate Winslet, Gloria Stuart, Victor Garber. (2005). Audio Commentary (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
      9. ^ ^{a b} Ed W. Marsh. (2005). Construction Timelapse (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
      10. ^ Marsh, p.130-141
      11. ^ Marsh, p.52-4
      12. ^ Marsh, p.161-68
      13. ^ ^{a b} Marsh, p.147-54
      14. ^ Marsh, p.65
      15. ^ (2005). VFX Shot Breakdown (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
      16. ^ (2005). VFX How To For First Class Lounge (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
      17. ^ James Cameron. (2005). Alternate Ending Commentary (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
      18. ^ James Cameron. (2005). Deleted scene commentaries (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
      19. ^ "Billy Crudup: "Titanic" Would've Sunk My Life", Internet Movie Database, 2000-06-22. Retrieved on 2007-06-14. 
      20. ^ "Actor Is Thankful He Didn't Get Titanic Role", Internet Movie Database, 1998-08-25. Retrieved on 2007-06-18. 
      21. ^ Liz Beardsworth. "Q&A: Claire Danes", Empire, 2006-01-02, pp. 79. Retrieved on 2007-06-18. 
      22. ^ "Nephew angered by tarnishing of Titanic hero", BBC News, 1998-01-24. Retrieved on 2007-02-19. 
      23. ^ "Titanic makers say sorry", BBC, 1998-04-15. Retrieved on 2007-02-22. 
      24. ^ James Cameron. (2005). Audio Commentary (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
      25. ^ Anders Falk. Titanic Ship's Tour (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
      26. ^ "Titanic Launch Reset", Internet Movie Database, 1997-05-28. Retrieved on 2007-06-15. 
      27. ^ "Titanic To Dock First In Japan", Internet Movie Database, 1997-09-30. Retrieved on 2007-06-15. 
      28. ^ "Titanic No Big Deal In Tokyo", Internet Movie Database, 1997-11-04. Retrieved on 2007-06-15. 
      29. ^ "Titanic sinks competitors without a trace", BBC, 1998-02-25. Retrieved on 2007-02-19. 
      30. ^ "Box Office", The New York Times. Retrieved on 2006-12-07. 
      31. ^ "All-Time Adjusted", Box Office Mojo. Retrieved on 2007-09-04. 
      32. ^ "All-Time Worldwide Boxoffice", Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2007-01-26. 
      33. ^ Titanic (1997). Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved on 2006-12-07.
      34. ^ Titanic. metacritic.com. Retrieved on 2006-12-07.
      35. ^ Roger Ebert. "Titanic", RogerEbert.com, 1997-12-19. Retrieved on 2006-12-07. 
      36. ^ Siskel & Ebert's Favourite and Least Favourite Movies of 1997. Retrieved on 2006-12-07.
      37. ^ A Film Review by James Berardinelli
      38. ^ James Berardinelli Top 10 of 1997
      39. ^ Kenneth Turan. "Titanic Sinks Again (Spectacularly)", Los Angeles Times, 1997-12-19. Retrieved on 2007-02-19. 
      40. ^ "TITANIC' FILMMAKERS SHOULD HAVE SUNK MORE MONEY INTO THE SCRIPT
      41. ^ "Titanic voted 'best' film ending", BBC News, 2003-10-15. Retrieved on 2007-06-15. 
      42. ^ "Titanic sinks in worst film poll", BBC News, 2003-11-05. Retrieved on 2007-06-15. 
      43. ^ "Clash of the Titanic". Retrieved on 2007-10-14. 
      44. ^ "Titanic sweeps Golden Globes", BBC, 1998-01-19. Retrieved on 2007-02-19. 
      45. ^ "Nominations for the 55th Golden Globe Awards", BBC, 1998-01-17. Retrieved on 2007-02-19. 
      46. ^ "Love story that won the heart of the Academy", BBC, 1998-03-24. Retrieved on 2007-02-19. 
      47. ^ Titanic Awards and Nominations
      48. ^ Titanic collector on amazon.com
      49. ^ special release on amazon.com
      50. ^ Deluxe edition on amazon.com
      51. ^ http://www.dvdactive.com/news/releases/titanic6.html
      52. ^ Titanic's 10th Anniversary Vessel. IGN (2007-10-18). Retrieved on 2008-03-02.
      53. ^ Parisi, Paula (1998). Titanic and the Making of James Cameron. London: Orion, 195. ISBN 0-7528-1799-X. 

      
      

      External links

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      Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

      Titanic
      • Titanic official website
      • Titanic at the Internet Movie Database
      • Titanic at All Movie Guide
      • Titanic at Rotten Tomatoes
      • Titanic at Metacritic
      • Titanic at Box Office Mojo

      Awards
      Preceded by The English Patient	Academy Award for Best Picture 1997	Succeeded by Shakespeare in Love
      	Golden Globe for Best Picture - Drama 1997	Succeeded by Saving Private Ryan

      v • d • e Academy Award for Best Picture

      Chariots of Fire (1981) · Gandhi (1982) · Terms of Endearment (1983) · Amadeus (1984) · Out of Africa (1985) · Platoon (1986) · The Last Emperor (1987) · Rain Man (1988) · Driving Miss Daisy (1989) · Dances with Wolves (1990) · The Silence of the Lambs (1991) · Unforgiven (1992) · Schindler's List (1993) · Forrest Gump (1994) · Braveheart (1995) · The English Patient (1996) · Titanic (1997) · Shakespeare in Love (1998) · American Beauty (1999) · Gladiator (2000) Complete List · (1928–1940) · (1941–1960) · (1961–1980) · (1981–2000) · (2001–present)

      v • d • e Films and television series by James Cameron
      1970s-1980s	Xenogenesis (1978) • Piranha II: The Spawning (1981) • The Terminator (1984) • Aliens (1986) • The Abyss (1989)
      1990s	Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) • True Lies (1994) • T2 3-D: Battle Across Time (1996) • Titanic (1997)
      2000s	Dark Angel (2000-2002) • Expedition: Bismarck (2002) • Ghosts of the Abyss (2003) • Aliens of the Deep (2005) • Avatar (2009) • Battle Angel (TBA) • The Dive (TBA)

      v • d • e RMS Titanic on film and TV
      Saved from the Titanic (1912) · In Nacht und Eis (1912) · Atlantic (1929) · Titanic (1943) · Titanic (1953) · A Night to Remember (1958) · S.O.S. Titanic (1979) · Raise the Titanic! (1980) · Titanic (TV miniseries) (1996) · Titanic (1997) · Ghosts of the Abyss (2003)

      v • d • e Image:United States film.png American films of the 1990s
      •1990 •1991 •1992 •1993 •1994 •1995 •1996 •1997 •1998 •1999

      ar:تيتانيك (فيلم)

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