Titanic - DVD Review

MOVIE
VIDEO
AUDIO
EXTRAS
OVERALL

One Disc
2.35:1 Anamorphic Widescreen
English Dolby Digital 5.1
English & French Dolby Digital 2.0
Spanish Subtitles
Original Theatrical Trailer
Run Time: 194
Keep Case

MOVIE
Rated PG-13 for violence, nudity, sex and language.

Do you know what immolation is? The act of destroying oneself by fire. This happens. Usually by more religiously ridiculous people, usually in one or two of them loser countries overseas. Why do I ask? Well, because I'm beginning a metaphorical immolation as we speak. But, as with those kooks, I'm not afraid, because I can stand behind the courage of my convictions. I feel comfortable proclaiming in a loud and booming voice that I liked Titanic! No. Wait. I LOVED Titanic. As with Psycho (1998), I have a bone to pick with the public, specifically film geeks, about Titanic. You see, I remember when everybody liked it. Oh yes, don't deny it lest your tongues turn black with your lies. Back before it was making money, remember? That first weekend that it made less than $30 million dollars and everybody proclaimed it a wonderful movie, but a bomb. Yeah, before it turned into the improbable juggernaut that it became, there was a time, yes, that everybody liked it. They were calling it beautiful and amazing and enchanting and, yes, even wonderful. But then the hype kicked in. The sinking ship began to plow through everything in its path, staying at the number one slot on the top ten list for weeks upon weeks upon weeks, denying every analyst's prediction about the next number one movie, crashing through record after record on its way to the top. And not only did it get there, but it crash-landed nearly $300 million dollars higher than the previous number one. Putting it in a position that not even Star Wars could knock it from. And then, my friends, oh, then you HATED it. Not necessarily because it was bad, but because it became this figurehead of the slightly sappy romance ending in tragedy. It's Romeo and Juliet. There's a reason that story is classic, because it's universal and because, like love, it's not always logical.
I'm sure you know, because I'm sure most everybody has seen it (though I'm not asserting that everybody liked it) Titanic is the story of Jack Dawson (Leonardo DiCaprio) a young artist with little money who wins a ticket on the Titanic in a poker game and an aristocratic young lady named Rose DeWitt Bukater (Kate Winslet), also on the journey with her mother Ruth (Frances Fisher) and her wealthy fiancée Cal Hockley (Billy Zane.) It is NOT about a sinking ship. I repeat. It is NOT about a sinking ship. Titanic is a love story about the boundaries of class and the desire to get out of your life, regardless of where you're placed. It takes place on the ill-fated Titanic, that famous sinking ship, but that is definitely not what it's about. I still assert, without regard for anyone's disdain from this statement that the first time I watched it, I was so caught up in the story that I completely forgot the ship was going to sink. But I'm like that. I give myself over to movies, allowing them to show me what they have, allowing for a more rich and fulfilling film-going experience. So few people do that. It's a damned shame, really.
So, yes, the ship does sink, and yes, it kills off much of the cast, but you've already surmised that. The film is a tragedy, like Romeo and Juliet. Natalia's father argues that there's no reason for these two people to fall in love and I staunchly disagree as someone who's fallen in love like that, when it's illogical, when it's fast, when you rightfully should give it more time to see, but it happens anyway. "Love isn't brains, children. It's blood." To quote a line from my favorite TV show about a vampire slayer. And that's true. The overly logical think this movie to death. Perhaps Jack and Rose shouldn't be able to fall in love so fast and truly don't have much more in common that what they've presented to each other aboard this cruise. But to two people who have no one truly (Rose's mother and fiancée are so absent to her thoughts that they may as well be nonexistent) the very fact of LISTENING is enough to fall in love with. An English teacher of mine once told me that there are only a handful of stories and Shakespeare wrote them all. And wrote their best selves. So Titanic is Romeo and Juliet. Improbable lovers thrown together by accident, torn apart by circumstance. So it bears questioning, why do we still "buy" Romeo and Juliet after so many years? Perhaps because deep down, we can feel the truth in the relationship. Perhaps because in so many romantic movies all we get is people finding reasons to love and this is an instance of those same two people loving with abandon, without regard to reason, and I find that pretty refreshing.
I'm staunch and unwavering in my feelings for Titanic. James Cameron has created a moving epic that reintroduced the epic to cinema. I don't think we would've had a Gladiator if a few years before we hadn't had a Titanic. But think what you want. I speak only as a fan of the film, and one who was moved by it. To those who saw it multiple times and disliked it more and more (I myself saw it multiple times without the diminished enjoyment) but you liked it the first time around. That's when it touched the purest emotions in you, before you became jaded or cynical or affected by the hype and the (oh no!) money it made. That's when it was at its best, when you just allowed yourself the wonderment and suspension of disbelief. And all was right with the world. Because in the sadness, there was still wonder and beauty. I'll finish with a single moment, Thomas Andrews (Victor Garber) the ship's designer stands before a fireplace as the ship sinks, winding his clock. He blames himself. Though his designs were changed and the number of lifeboats he requested was denied. So he's content to go down with the ship. It's a moment frozen in time that did occur on the actual ship. Survivors described seeing Andrews in his stateroom at the end. It's a moment I'll never forget.

VIDEO QUALITY
Where's the Anamorphic transfer guys? C'mon! I know it was early, but you were already doing Anamorphic transfers way back then. So thus, Titanic suffers on the video end, for lack of an Anamorphic transfer. The film itself, on your normal 4:3 TVs looks great. Titanic was one of the first overtly digitally created films, with more effects shots than any other before it. The computer designed ship and sunsets look phenomenal on this DVD, rich and nearly painted on, as do the blacks and whites, most evident in Rose's outfit as she comes aboard, a blast of white that doesn't blow out. The film is presented in its original 2.35:1 theatrical aspect ratio and looks fantastic in this format. Incidentally, full frame versions of this film (this is not one of them) are not cropped or pan and scanned. Cameron hates both methods of getting a 1.33:1 ratio so he shoots full frame with the intention of cropping to 2.35:1. What does this mean? The full frame version has many more hats and feet than the widescreen version, and little else.

AUDIO QUALITY
The audio is tremendous, with James Horner's score filling the room every time it comes up, the dialogue sounding fantastic, crisp and clear, hanging in the center. But the Dolby Digital 5.1 really shines as the ship begins to sink and the sound mix takes on a claustrophobic echoey feel as metal bends and breaks. Take special note to the scenes in the boiler room beneath the ship and the scenes between Jack and Rose in the steadily flooding basement staterooms. The Titanic laserdisc, released not long before, contained a DTS track, and one wonders why this track wasn't present on the DVD, but the 5.1 track does just fine and I'm more than content.

EXTRAS
Well, we all know James Cameron likes to re-edit things and release longer cuts. And he loves behind the scenes documentaries. All one has to do is glance at both The Abyss and the Terminator 2 DVDs as well as his longer cut of Aliens to realize that. So why, despite claiming that he has much footage, a longer cut, and documentaries galore, do we get a single trailer on the DVD. And why do we get just a single theatrical trailer, none of the teasers that came out for the film. Especially the one that just featured the Titanic's propeller lifting out of the water and Kathy Bates saying something like "Oh my Lord."

CLOSING THOUGHTS
My immolation has been cut short. I'm not ashamed of my love for this movie. It's not like my insane enjoyment of Return of the Killer Tomatoes and the latter two Sleepaway Camps. Titanic did win eleven Academy Awards, tying it with Ben Hur. It also made over a billion dollars worldwide. I think that means I've got a few people who sit in my camp as well. Those of us that allowed ourselves to be enchanted by the film. So I don't apologize for it. And those who agree also shouldn't. Oh, and the fact that it's nearly impossible to keep clothes ON Kate Winslet in films doesn't hurt either. Have I negated my passion? Oh, bother.