Titanic is a 1997 American
romantic drama film directed, written, and co-produced by James Cameron about the sinking of the RMS Titanic. It stars
Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio as Rose
DeWitt Bukater and Jack Dawson respectively, members of different social classes who fall in love aboard the ill-fated
1912 maiden voyage of the ship. Bill Paxton plays Brock
Lovett, the leader of a treasure hunting expedition, while Gloria Stuart has the role of
the elderly Rose, who narrates the story in 1996. The film was both a critical and commercial success, winning eleven
Academy Awards including Best
Picture, and became the highest grossing film of all time, with a total worldwide gross of US$1.8 billion.
Plot
In 1996, treasure hunter Brock Lovett and his team explore the wreck of the RMS Titanic searching for a necklace called “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 100, who claims to be the nude woman in the drawing. She and her granddaughter Lizzy visit
Lovett on his ship, and 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 and her mother, Ruth DeWitt Bukater, and her fiancé, Caledon Hockley.
Distraught and frustrated with her engagement to Cal and controlled life, Rose attempts to commit suicide, but a drifter and artist named Jack Dawson intervenes. They strike up a tentative friendship as he
shares stories of his adventures traveling and sketching, and their bond deepens when they leave the first-class formal dinner
for a much livelier gathering in third-class.
Cal is informed of her partying in the steerage and forbids Rose to meet Jack again. Eventually, Jack confronts Rose alone,
but she is inclined to ignore their growing affection because of her engagement and responsibilities. However, 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." Afterward the two run away from Hockley's manservant, Spicer Lovejoy, where they go
below decks to the cargo hold. They enter a car and have sex, and afterwards escape
up to the ship's forward well deck. Rose decides that she will leave the ship with Jack. They then witness the ship's collision
with an iceberg. Cal discovers Rose's nude drawing. He plots revenge, deciding to frame Jack for
stealing the "Heart of the Ocean", and bribes the master-at-arms to handcuff and trap Jack in a room. 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 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 to die and realizes that he unintentionally gave Rose
the diamond. 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 after 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 eventually reunite. Around them, well over a thousand people are dying a
painful death from hypothermia. Meanwhile, in Lifeboat 6, Margaret "Molly" Brown tries to
convince Quartermaster Robert Hichens to go back and rescue people, as there is plenty of
room, but he refuses, thinking the boat 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 gets 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 frozen to death. 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 he does not hear her and rows
away, seemingly leaving her to die. Still remembering her promise to "never to 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 Wilde and blows it. She is pulled to safety, joining the 5 other survivors from the water, and boards the
RMS Carpathia. On the Carpathia's deck, Rose notices Cal looking for her. When he
turns in her direction, she turns away, not letting him see her face. This is the last time she ever sees Hockley. Upon arrival
in New York City, Rose registers her name as "Rose Dawson".
The
Titanic's bow end plunges underwater.
After completing her story, the elderly Rose alone travels to the stern of Lovett's ship. After she steps onto the railing, it
is revealed she had the "Heart of the Ocean" all along, as Cal had slipped into her coat. She then drops the diamond into the
water. Rose lies in a 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 embrace, and the people on the staircase start to applaud. It is left up to the viewer to
dictate the meaning of the ending, specifically whether it is truly a vision or Rose reuniting with her love, Jack in the
afterlife.
Cast
-
- 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 whole new lease on life when she meets Jack Dawson.
- 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, and he shows her a carefree way of life of which she had often fantasized but
never realized of doing.
- Billy Zane as Caledon "Cal"
Nathan Hockley: The quintessential arrogant and snobbish first-class man, Rose's fiancé Cal becomes increasingly
embarrassed, jealous, and cruel over Rose's friendship with Jack. He gives Rose the diamond The Heart of the Ocean as a
reminder of her feelings for him.
- 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.
- Kathy Bates as Margaret Tobin "Molly"
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 dining-suit when he is invited to dinner in the first-class saloon.
- Victor Garber as Thomas
Andrews, Jr.: The ship's designer, Andrews is depicted during the sinking of the ship as standing next to the clock in
the first class smoking room. 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 when the ships hits the
iceberg. He goes into wheelhouse as it sinks, dying when the water bursts through the windows.
- Jonathan Hyde as J. Bruce Ismay:
Ismay is portrayed as an ignorant first-class rich man, who does not know who Sigmund
Freud is. He cowardly takes the opportunity to get into a lifeboat, and looks back, guilt-stricken, as his ship
sinks.
- David Warner as Spicer
Lovejoy: An ex-Pinkerton constable, Lovejoy is Cal's
English bodyguard who keeps an eye on Rose and is suspicious of the circumstances of Jack's rescue of her.
- Danny Nucci as Fabrizio De
Rossi: Jack's Italian friend who comes aboard the RMS Titanic after winning a card game.
- Jason Barry as Tommy
Ryan: An Irish third-class passenger who befriends Jack and Fabrizio.
- 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 Dawson 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 accompanies her on her visit to Lovett.
- Lewis Abernathy as Lewis Bodine: Lovett's geeky friend,
who expresses doubt at first whether Rose is telling the truth.
- Eric Braeden as Colonel John Jacob
Astor IV: A first-class passenger whom Rose calls "the richest man on the ship". The film depicts him and his
19-year-old wife Madeleine as being introduced to Jack by Rose in the first-class
saloon.
- 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.
- Ewan Stewart as First Officer William McMaster Murdoch: The film's most controversial depiction, Murdoch shoots and kills
men who try to enter a lifeboat under Smith's order of women and children
first, before committing suicide out of guilt.
- Jonathan Phillips as Second Officer Charles Lightoller: The film depicts him 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 officer who led a lifeboat to retrieve survivors of the sinking.
Several crew members of the Akademik Mstislav Keldysh appear in the
film, including Anatoly Sagalevitch, creator of the Mir submersibles.[2] 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.[3]
Production
| "The story could not have been written better... The juxstaposition of rich and poor, the gender
roles played out unto death (women first), the stoicism and nobility of a bygone age, the magnificence of the great ship matched
in scale only be the folly of the men who drove her hell-bent through the darkness. And above all the lesson: that life is
uncertain, the future unknowable... the unthinkable possible." |
| — James Cameron[4] |
James Cameron was fascinated by shipwrecks,
including the RMS Titanic, and wrote a treatment for a film.[5] 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.[4] The treasure hunter Brock Lovett is meant to
represent those who never connected with the human element of the tragedy.[2]
He met with 20th Century Fox, and convinced them to make a film based on the
publicity afforded by shooting the wreck itself[5]
and organized a dive to the wreck of the Titanic over two years.[4] 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.[5] Cameron
asked Claire Danes to play Rose, but she was exhausted after Baz Luhrmann's [[William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet]], and found Titanic too
similar.[6] Billy
Crudup and Stephen Dorff were considered for the role of Jack.[7][8]
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.[9]
Twentieth Century 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-feet lifting platform for the ship to tilt during the
sinking sequences. Towering above was a 162 feet tall tower crane on 600-feet of railtrack,
acting as a combined construction, lighting and camera platform.[2] After shooting the sinking scenes, the ship was then dismantled and sold for scrap metal to cover
budgetary costs.
Filming
The modern day scenes were shot on the Akademik Mstislav Keldysh in
July 1996.[2] It was during this shoot that
someone sprinkled phencyclidine (PCP) 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.[10] Principal photography for Titanic began in September 1996
at the newly-built Fox Baja Studios.[2] 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.[12] For the safety of the stuntmen, many props were made of foam rubber.[13] By November 15, they were shooting the boarding scenes.[12] 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 and gave it the look of sailing, but this posed a problem for
shooting the ship's departure from Southampton: 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.[14]
Filming Titanic was an arduous experience for all involved. The schedule was intended to last 138 days but grew to 160
- 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 apologised 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 wouldn't work with Cameron again unless she earned "a lot of money." She admitted Cameron was a nice man, but had too
much of a temper.[10]
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 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.[2] The post-sinking scenes in the freezing Atlantic were
shot in a 350,000 gallon tank,[15] 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.[9]
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.[16] He encouraged them to
shoot their 45-foot long miniature of the ship as if "we're making a
commercial for the White Star Line."[17] 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 long model of the ship's stern that could
break in two repeatedly, the only miniature to be used in water.[16] 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.[18] To save money, the First Class Lounge was a miniature set incorporated into a greenscreen
backdrop.[19]
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's 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, but she does let him hold it. Accepting that treasure is worthless, he starts to laugh at his
stupidity. Lewis Bodine, upset that they almost had the jackpot, yells "That really sucks, lady!" 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, and found the resolution too neat and humorous.[20]
During his first test screening, Cameron felt that the preview audience liked the
film, but they did not really enjoy a nine minute chase/fight scene written to give the film a bit of suspense and for Jack to
give Lovejoy his comeuppance, but the test audiences stated it would be unrealistic to risk one's life for wealth. In this scene,
Cal offers to give Lovejoy, his valet, the Heart of the Ocean if he can kill Jack and Rose, and Lovejoy goes after the lovers in
the sinking First Class Dining Room. Just as they are about to escape him, Rose drops a plate that alerts him to her, but Jack
attacks him and smashes his head against a glass window (explaining where he got the gash on his head), in revenge for framing
him for the "theft" of the necklace. Cameron cut this scene for time constraints.[citation needed]
Historical accuracy
James 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.[4]
In one controversial scene, First Officer William Murdoch, played by
Ewan Stewart, is shown fatally shooting some passengers during the frenzy to get to the
lifeboats. Ashamed of what he has done, he commits suicide. When his nephew Scott Murdoch saw the film, he objected to his
uncle's portrayal as inaccurate and damaging to Murdoch's heroic reputation, considering that he did try to get a number of
passengers off.[21] 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.[22] Cameron apologized on the DVD commentary, but noted that there were
officers who fired gunshots to follow the "women and children first"
policy.
Release
Paramount Pictures and Twentieth 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.[24] The film premiered on November 1,
1997, at the Tokyo International Film
Festival,[25] where reaction was described as
"tepid" by the New York Times.[26]
Box office
The film received steady attendance after opening in North America on 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.[27] The movie stayed in theaters
for over 8 months. Some theaters in 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.[28] Adjusted
for inflation, it is in sixth place.[29]The film also
holds the record as the highest-grossing movie of all time, worldwide,
with $1.8 billion.[30] The second-place worldwide holder,
Return of the King, is over $700 million
short of Titanic's record.
There has been word of a re-release of Titanic, due to its successful original run, as well as the advances that could
be made in the special effects and digital enhancement presentation. Titanic's director, James Cameron, is said to be
considering a re-release of the film in digital 3-D.[31]
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.[32] Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Gloria Stuart, and James Cameron's screenplay were also nominees but lost.[33] 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, visual effects, sound,
sound effects, original dramatic score, film
editing, song, art direction, and 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.[34] 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.
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.[35]
American Film Institute
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. |
Critical reception
The film garnered mostly positive reviews from critics. It has been a "Certified Fresh" film on Rotten Tomatoes, with 83% overall approval from critics and 79% from users.[36] The film received a 74/100 metascore on Metacritic, classified as a generally favorable reviewed film. Metacritic users also awarded it with a 7.4/10
average rating.[37]
Roger Ebert has said, "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."[38] It was one of his top ten films of 1997.[39]
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."[40] It is his second best movie of 1997.[41]
Some reviewers felt that the story and dialogue were weak, while the visuals were spectacular. Kenneth Turan's review in the LA 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."[42] 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."[43]
Titanic suffered backlash from many after its release. In 2003, the film topped a poll of "Best Film Endings,"[44] and yet it also topped a poll by The Film programme as, "the worst movie of all time."[45] Parodies and spoofs abounded and were circulated around the Internet, often
inspiring passionate responses from fans of various opinions of the film.[46]
Soundtrack
-
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 famous Canadian diva 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".[47] 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.
DVD
-
References
- Ed W. Marsh (1998). James Cameron's Titanic. London: Boxtree. ISBN
0-7522-2404-2.
- ^ "Box office statistics for Titanic (1997)". BoxOfficeMojo.com. Retrieved
October 15 2006.
- ^ a b c d e f Marsh, p.3-29
- ^ Anders Falk. Titanic Ship's Tour (DVD). Twentieth Century Fox.
- ^ a b c d Marsh, p.v-xiii
- ^ a b c
- ^ Liz Beardsworth. "Q&A: Claire Danes", Empire, 2006-01-02, pp. 79. Retrieved on 2007-06-18.
- ^ "Billy Crudup: "Titanic" Would've Sunk My Life", Internet Movie Database, 2000-06-22. Retrieved on 2007-06-14.
- ^ "Actor Is Thankful He Didn't Get Titanic Role", Internet Movie Database, 1998-08-25. Retrieved on 2007-06-18.
- ^ a b Marsh, p.36-8
- ^ a b Andrew Gumbel. "Lights, cameras,
blockbuster: The return of James Cameron", The Independent, 2007-01-11. Retrieved on 2007-06-11.
- ^ a b Ed W. Marsh. (2005). Construction Timelapse (DVD). Twentieth Century Fox.
- ^ Marsh, p.130-141
- ^ Marsh, p.52-4
- ^ Marsh, p.161-68
- ^ a b Marsh, p.147-54
- ^ Marsh, p.65
- ^ (2005). VFX Shot Breakdown (DVD). Twentieth Century Fox.
- ^ (2005). VFX How To For First Class Lounge (DVD). Twentieth Century Fox.
- ^ James Cameron. (2005). Alternate
Ending Commentary (DVD). Twentieth Century Fox.
- ^ "Nephew angered by tarnishing of Titanic hero", BBC News, 1998-01-24. Retrieved on 2007-02-19.
- ^ "Titanic makers say sorry", BBC, 1998-04-15. Retrieved on 2007-02-22.
- ^ "Titanic Launch Reset", Internet Movie
Database, 1997-05-28. Retrieved on 2007-06-15.
- ^ "Titanic To Dock First In Japan", Internet Movie
Database, 1997-09-30. Retrieved on 2007-06-15.
- ^ "Titanic No Big Deal In Tokyo", Internet Movie
Database, 1997-11-04. Retrieved on 2007-06-15.
- ^ "Titanic sinks competitors without a trace", BBC, 1998-02-25.
Retrieved on 2007-02-19.
- ^ "Box
Office", The New York Times. Retrieved on 2006-12-07.
- ^ "All-Time Adjusted", Box Office Mojo. Retrieved on
2007-09-04.
- ^ "All-Time Worldwide Boxoffice", Internet
Movie Database. Retrieved on 2007-01-26.
- ^ "'Titanic' director: Digital cinema will save biz", ZDNet, 2006-04-24. Retrieved on 2007-06-15.
- ^ "Titanic sweeps Golden Globes", BBC, 1998-01-19. Retrieved on
2007-02-19.
- ^ "Nominations for the 55th Golden Globe Awards", BBC, 1998-01-17. Retrieved on 2007-02-19.
- ^ "Love story that won
the heart of the Academy", BBC, 1998-03-24. Retrieved on 2007-02-19.
- ^ Titanic Awards and Nominations
- ^ Titanic (1997). Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved on 2006-12-07.
- ^ Titanic. metacritic.com. Retrieved on 2006-12-07.
- ^ Roger Ebert. "Titanic", RogerEbert.com, 1997-12-19. Retrieved on 2006-12-07.
- ^ Siskel & Ebert's Favourite and Least Favourite Movies of 1997. Retrieved on
2006-12-07.
- ^ A Film Review by James Berardinelli
- ^ James Berardinelli Top 10 of 1997
- ^ Kenneth Turan. "Titanic Sinks
Again (Spectacularly)", LA Times, 1997-12-19.
Retrieved on 2007-02-19.
- ^ "TITANIC'
FILMMAKERS SHOULD HAVE SUNK MORE MONEY INTO THE SCRIPT
- ^ "Titanic voted 'best' film ending", BBC News,
2003-10-15. Retrieved on 2007-06-15.
- ^ "Titanic sinks in worst film poll", BBC News,
2003-11-05. Retrieved on 2007-06-15.
- ^ "Clash of the Titanic". Retrieved on 2007-10-14.
- ^ Parisi, Paula (1998). Titanic and the Making of James Cameron. London: Orion, 195. ISBN
0-7528-1799-X.
External links
Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: