Two Movies for the Price of One -- Too Bad Only One of Them Is Decent

Rating: 6/10 (16 July 2009)

"Titanic" is really two movies: one of them is an exciting, James Cameron-style action film, "The Poseidon Adventure" with better special effects; the other is a dull as dirt period romance, so simplistic and clichÃ© it seems like something conceived in the mind of a twelve-year-old girl.
Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet became household names because of their performances in this, and they do invest the film with a great deal of spunk, but they've got absolutely terrible material to work with. Cameron is clearly no writer, but he is a good director of action, so just tune in to this one once the big ship has actually hit the iceberg, and you'll save yourself a lot of time.
The supporting cast includes Kathy Bates as Molly Brown, Frances Fisher as Winslet's uptight and aristocratic mother, Victor Garber as the skipper..er...captain, and Billy Zane, in an embarrassingly awful role as the movie's villain. The character as written is like something out of a silent movie, and Zane plays him as such -- if he had a mustache, he'd be twirling it. Too bad his performance is completely at odds with the totally contemporary performances of just about everyone else.
Cameron reveals an almost fetishistic obsession with recreating the glamour of the famed ocean liner, and the glee with which he then goes about demolishing it and the people on it borders on the disturbing. It's like watching a little boy build an elaborate train set just so he can have the pleasure of blowing it up with firecrackers.
Grade: B