Titanic (1997)

Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Billy Zane, and Bill Paxton.  Cinematography by Russell Carpenter. Editing by Conrad Buff, James Cameron, and Richard A. Harris.  Produced by James Cameron and Jon Landau.  Written and Directed by James Cameron.

In the present day explorers are searching the wreckage of the R.M.S. Titanic for the Hope Diamond which was rumored to be on board when the ship went down.  A drawing is discovered that depicts the diamond being worn by a beautiful, young woman and the image finds its way on to the news. Shortly thereafter a woman calls the crew saying that she is that woman in that picture.

Her name is Rose (played by Gloria Stuart), one of the seven hundred and five survivors of the disaster.  She is brought on board the research vessel and tells her story of lost love aboard the ship.  In 1912 Rose (a younger version played by Kate Winslet) was a spoiled rich girl who was depressed and on the verge of suicide.

She is talked from jumping off the bow of the ship by Jack (played by Leonardo DiCaprio), a poor man who won his passage on the ship from a lucky bet.  The two quickly fall in love, but the cards are stacked against them as the ship heads towards its watery grave.

James Cameron, one of the greatest science fiction filmmakers of all time, had concerns about being labeled as a genre director and wanted to expand his portfolio with projects outside of his mainstay.  So for his next project Cameron turned to a love story set upon the ill fated Titanic that he started developing back in 1987. Titanic was indeed unlike anything he had ever worked on before, but like his previous projects Cameron seemed to spare no expense on the set.

He had seven scaled down models of the ship built for the film, ranging from one twentieth scale to nearly a full sized recreation of the Titanic that was eight hundred feet long. A tank that could hold nearly eighteen million gallons of water was constructed specifically for use in the film. The film also had over a hundred speaking parts and over a thousand extras, all of which needed to be dressed in lavish period costumes.  In the end the given budget of one hundred and twenty million dollars expanded to over two hundred million, breaking Cameron’s own record again as the most expensive movie ever produced.

Titanic was undoubtedly going to be a hit, but no one could have predicted the degree of success that it achieved.  In the later part of 1997, and the first half of 1998, the entire world seemed to be afflicted with some sort of Titanic related obsessive compulsive disorder.  In the US box office Titanic spent fifteen weeks at number one and an additional sixteen in the top ten. 

Theaters were playing the film so damn much that Paramount had to send out replacement copies for reels that had literally been worn out.  It became the top grossing film of all time not just domestically, but across the globe and was the first film to ever earn over a billion dollars worldwide.  The film has suffered a bad case of overexposure in recent years, but Titanic is a beautiful film and will surely find an audience in future generations.

Budget: $200,000,000

Total US Gross: $600,788,188

Genre: Romance

Runtime: 194 Minutes

US Release Date: 12/19/97

Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1

Awards:

Academy Awards: 
Won for best art direction/set decoration, cinematography, costume design, sound effects, visual effects, editing, score, song, sound, director, and picture. 
Nominated for best make-up, supporting actress, and actress.

Golden Globes: 
Won for best score, original song, director, and dramatic picture.
Nominated for best screenplay, actress in a supporting role, actor in a drama, and actress in a drama.

Directors Guild of America: 
Won the Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures. 

Writers Guild of America: 
Nominated for Best Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen.

American Film Institute’s Top 100 Lists: 
100 Years… 100 Thrills (#25)
100 Years… 100 Passions (#37)
100 Years… 100 Songs (#14 – “My Heart Will Go On”)
100 Years… 100 Movie Quotes (#100 – “I’m the king of the world!”).

Tagline: Collide With Destiny.

Quote: “God himself could not sink this ship.”