Curtis Edmonds -- blueduck@hsbr.org
Confession time: I have never, ever seen Gone With the Wind. I don't know why, really. Haven't wanted to check it out on video, haven't been at home the nights it was on network TV, and it was too far to drive the last time it was on the big-screen. So right up front, I'll admit that I don't know what the heck I'm talking about, but here goes...
Is Titanic the Gone With the Wind of the 1990's?
Maybe that's going a little bit too far. As good a job as Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet do in this movie, they're no Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh. But... the parallels are there. GWTW was the first movie to take real advantage of the most revolutionary technology available -- Technicolor. Titanic takes revolutionary steps forward in seamlessly integrating computer graphic design with actors. GWTW places America's greatest tragedy in the background of a classic love story, Titanic does the same with the Atlantic's most legendary tragedy. They both have strong-willed redheaded heroines, they both exploit the class differences between the aristocracy and the slaves/steerage bums, they were both incredibly expensive and popular... OK, maybe that's not enough parallels.
So Titanic's not in GWTW's league. No matter. Titanic is a great movie in its own right, complete with spills, thrills and (especially) chills. Much has been made of the humongous cost of the production, and all of the care than went into making the huge luxury liner come alive again. The money was obviously well-spent. The costumes look great, the sets look great, the CGI graphics look great. I especially liked the expensive little touches, like spending tons of money on authentic Titanic china only to break it all on the floor as the ship sinks. But writer/director/producer James Cameron's real challenge in writing/directing/ producing Titanic wasn't just costuming and set design and special effects. Cameron's major headache was keeping the audience interested in a tale where everybody knows the ending going in. He succeeds masterfully.
Cameron does two things that work incredibly well. First, he shows us modern-day salvage operations on Titanic (that's just "Titanic", not "the Titanic", mind you). The first glimpse we get of Titanic is the ship in its present state, corroding slowly away under the hammering pressure of the North Atlantic, from the window of a minisub piloted by treasure hunter Brock Lovett (Bill Paxton). Television coverage of the exploration of Titanic intrigues 101-year-old Rose Calvert (Gloria Stuart), who survived the wreck in 1912. Stuart does a phenomenal job in a brief role, narrating the story of her experience to a stunned Paxton and his roughneck crew.
Secondly, Cameron keeps the storyline focused almost exclusively on the Rose character, and the romantic triangle between Rose (Winslet), her bastard millionaire fiancee Cal Hockley (Billy Zane) and the irrepressible young artist Jack Daswon (DiCaprio). The way that big-budget disaster movies usually go wrong is to have an all-star cast, so we see the impact of the disaster on a wide group of people. Cameron wisely chooses to stick with Rose and Jack, while paying scant heed to the celebrities on board. The supporting cast is professional, but mostly anonymous -- other than Kathy Bates as the Unsinkable Molly Brown, there's no moment when you stop and say, oh, yeah, I know him, what's he been in. (Although I would like to have seen Colm Meaney in a White Star uniform, or even as the ill-fated engineer.)
The love story itself is rather conventional. I think some reviewers found it weak, and that may be a fair criticism. The performances are the key here. Zane has the meatiest part in the movie, and he plays the arrogant, condescending steel millionaire to the hilt. He's smooth, he looks great in a tuxedo, and he's a convincing enough jerk that the Winslet-DiCaprio relationship looks plausible. At the moment when he sees a little girl too frightened to get aboard a lifeboat, you can hear the wheels in his mind turning, saying not "Can I save this little girl?", but "Can she help me get on a lifeboat?"
DiCaprio is a revelation. I hadn't seen him before in anything, and didn't know what the heck to expect, really. (Honestly, I expected a bad Irish accent, but Cameron evidently decided that was a bad idea, so DiCaprio plays a poor American artist who wins a ticket in a poker game.) DiCaprio exhibits an infectious joy at being alive, and being on the Titanic, that it's hard not to like him. From the moment that the ship leaves port until it hits the iceberg, DiCaprio has to carry the movie and keep our interest, and he never falters.
Winslet's character grows up a lot during the movie, and so does her performance. At first, she's not required to do anything but wear period clothing and look drop-dead gorgeous. We know from the narration that she's monstrously unhappy with her arranged marriage to Zane, but there isn't any expression of these feelings until she encounters DiCaprio. Winslet and DiCaprio develop a chemistry that manages to propel the movie along until the ship hits the iceberg.
It's at that moment where Winslet's character really comes alive. Faced with real danger, she drops her spoiled-rich-girl mannerisms and does a splendid job. As Rose and Jack race around the doomed ship, looking for shelter from the freezing water and Cal's fiery temper, Winslet turns in a superb acting performance, mixing courage and compassion and anger with sheer shrieking terror.
Of course, the most interesting character is the ship itself. Cameron has clearly fallen in love with Titanic, and shows her in every mood -- as a deserted wreck, down in the boiler room, up on the bridge, down in the hold, at the captain's table, down in steerage -- and manages to bring the great ship back from the dead. Cameron's greatest gift is that he allows us to fall in love with Titanic as well.
Grade: A+
-- Curtis "BlueDuck" Edmonds blueduck@hsbr.org
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