Great movie, but iffy casting

Rating: Null/10 (22 February 2004)

It's hard to add a lot to what over a thousand people have said before, so I'll keep the comments short. This is a fantastic movie. The effort that James Cameron put into filming the sinking ship is mind-boggling. And it works. Well worth seeing. A love story, an action/adventure disaster movie, and a historical epic set on the high seas (accurate down to the smallest detail)--- all in one.
It's hard to imagine this movie ever becoming a classic of the "Gone With the Wind" type, though, because of the casting. Great classic films have great classic persona-creating performances, and this movie just doesn't have that. Leonardo DiCaprio in particular is a very talented, engaging young actor, and it's not his fault that an extremely ambitious epic movie like this was simply too heavy for him to carry. But unfortunately, that's the case. I can't say that he was too young for the part--- but the character of Jack was definitely too young for the movie. This film needed more substance than he could give it. DiCaprio is simply too close to being a teen idol (at least a 1912 version of one). Of course that's precisely why so many teen girls flocked to see this film multiple times, and is a big part of the movie's huge success.
Kate Winslet also is an endearing young actress, and you really felt for Rose in her bravery throughout all of her trials and tribulations. But even after the mega-success of this film, Winslet still doesn't have a clearly-defined persona. Maybe the problem is that we don't have old-school movie stars anymore. We have "actors" now, and most of them are better at acting than the classic movie stars ever were. But the old-style stars had personality plus, and THAT'S what this movie needed to make it a true classic.
Having said that, though, I really don't mean to be negative. This is a grand story, told extremely well--- and the sinking of the ship has the advantage of being a TRUE story as well. Never was this tragic event duplicated on screen so well, so accurately, or so effectively. By the way, the music was awesome.