A powerful piece of American folk art

Rating: 9/10 (26 December 2015)

James Cameron's Titanic is obviously the work of someone obsessed with his subject, and it shows. Everything, from the wallpaper in the 1st Class Suites to the bunks in 3rd Class, from the bow where Jack and Rose have their first meeting to the wireless room where Harold Bride and Jack Phillips desperately sent their (ultimately futile) SOS signals for emergency assistance, is, as it were, "as it was." Cameron even ensures that the audience is never in doubt as to the horrific fate of the 1500 people left aboard Titanic when the lifeboats left; there was no absence of life jackets, and most of the people left behind froze to death in the icy waters off the Grand Banks of Newfoundland. For most Americans born after the discovery of the Titanic's wreck by Robert Ballard in 1986, this film was their introduction to the fascinating, tragic story of the "unsinkable" ship of dreams.
All of this, of course, would mean nothing if the film was a dud. And truthfully, the script ain't Shakespeare. Kate Winslet's Rose is made to remark that " it appears there are not enough life boats for everyone aboard" while on a tour of the ship early in the film. Hint, hint. Poor Billy Zane isn't given much to work with in Cal, Rose's one note fiancée. Her choice between ego-maniacal capitalist and sensitive, artistic proletarian isn't much of a choice at all. And good old Leo looks, more than 15 years on, like he's strutting onto the ship from 90s middle America, not 1912. But I'm quibbling.
No, Jack and Rose would never have been able to meet in real life. No, Jack would never in a million years have been allowed to attend a dinner in 1st Class. No, no 1st class girls got to attend quaint Irish dance parties in 3rd Class (was this in keeping with the "Riverdance" phenomenon of the time, James?). And the heart-rending last moments between our star crossed lovers on the floating door would have been quite impossible (hypothermia would have set in within five minutes, and their bodies would have been twitching like crazy from the shock of the below-freezing water, thus preventing any kind of coherent conversation at all). But in the end, none of that matters much. At it's heart, Titanic is a piece of classic American folk art. It's not meant for the highbrow crowd; there aren't long lingering shots open to multiple interpretations. Jack's observation that Monet's "use of color" is "great" is, to be sure, wince inducing. But at it's heart, Titanic works because it reflects our own deepest, personal wishes; our most cherished and deeply held dreams. The dream to break out of our personal circumstances and live our lives as we wish to live them (to quote Jack early in the film). And of course, to love and be loved so deeply, that even if we only know the person for seventy two hours and are separated from them for 84 years, we remember them and our time with them as if it were yesterday.To know what it is to finally meet the one person who you would happily, even gratefully, give up your own life to save. This is the kind of love all humans dream of, but seldom find. The best art reflects and interprets dreams common to humankind; by telling this story in this particular way, James Cameron has succeeded spectacularly in creating a visual tone poem to human yearning. Even if the first half of the film seems like a trite soap opera, the emotional impact of the final moments alone puts everything you've seen in the first three hours into sharp perspective.
One wonders how many people in that freezing water more than a hundred years ago now felt as Jack did in those final moments. We'll never know, but Cameron has given them a fine memorial in this imperfect masterpiece of populist cinema.