Much ado about a sinking ship

Rating: 5/10 (19 June 2005)

As we all know Titanic won Best Picture and Best Director, and 9 other Oscars in 1997, out of 14 nominations -- quite an achievement. This equalled the all-time record total of 11 Academy Awards also held by Ben Hur (1959) and The Return of the King (2003). And yet Titanic has also received a mention on several worst movie lists. In 2003, for example, as part of a BBC listener's poll, one person said: "My father fell asleep after 20 minutes. He was lucky. It was only his snoring that kept me awake."
Seriously though, I was disappointed with Titanic. In my humble opinion it was too long, with too many special effects, and a story that became fragmented because it was crosscut with another.
Having a look at The Academy's Best Picture winners over the years, there are several films which I think could be described as "epics" which haven't quite made the grade. These films seem to go on for as long as they possibly can, incorporate the largest cast of extras possible, and usually have several or more special sequences. Unfortunately, I see Titanic as one of these films.
Other epics which have won Best Picture, and which have left me rather disappointed, are Gandhi, Amadeus, The Last Emperor, Out of Africa, and Gladiator.