James Cameron's Titanic is a romantic disaster epic set during the historic shipwreck of the RMS Titanic in 1912. At the time of its release, it was the most expensive film ever made, costing $200 million dollars to make. It became a critical and commercial success and won eleven Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director.
The story concerns a young woman, Rose DeWitt Bukater (played by Kate Winslet), who is promised in marriage to the wealthy Cal (played by Billy Zane). Rose's mother makes it clear to Rose that they need Cal's money. Rose feels trapped by her life and engagement and tries to commit suicide by jumping off the Titanic. Jack Dawson(played by Leonardo DiCaprio), a poor artist, stops her from committing suicide and saves her after she slips on the railing. The two develop a romance and love blossoms, despite Rose's mother and fiance's attempts to separate them. When the Titanic strikes an iceberg, their love is tested as the ship begins its decent into the icy Atlantic Ocean.
The story concerns a young woman, Rose DeWitt Bukater (played by Kate Winslet), who is promised in marriage to the wealthy Cal (played by Billy Zane). Rose's mother makes it clear to Rose that they need Cal's money. Rose feels trapped by her life and engagement and tries to commit suicide by jumping off the Titanic. Jack Dawson(played by Leonardo DiCaprio), a poor artist, stops her from committing suicide and saves her after she slips on the railing. The two develop a romance and love blossoms, despite Rose's mother and fiance's attempts to separate them. When the Titanic strikes an iceberg, their love is tested as the ship begins its decent into the icy Atlantic Ocean.
Above all, Titanic is a love story. Like many Romantic works, Titanic was full of melodrama. Rose was the damsel in distress, stuck in a life she did not want, with suicide as the only option out. Incredibly, just as she is about to jump, she meets Jack, the hero of the story and the man who ends up rescuing her in many ways. He rescues her from her marriage to Cal and rescues her from death after the ship sinks. The characters are somewhat one-dimensional and sometimes the dialogue is laughable. For example:
Like many Romantic pieces, this film championed feeling things, and not so much thinking things.
Jack Dawson is the typical romantic archetype of the Hero Artist. This is a person who typically rejects the rules of society, paving his/her own way in this world. He does not settle down, work a normal job, nor live a regular life. Instead, he travels the world, cavorting with prostitutes and drawing their portraits. He drinks and gambles, but also seems to be searching a deep meaning and truth in life, which he tries to express through his art. Romantics put their greatest hope in artists and believed that they were the key to improving the world. Jack strongly fits into this archetype, and he ends up being the great hero of Titanic, sacrificing his own life to save Rose.
Screenshot from Titanic: Jack Dawson drawing.
What Titanic lacked in character development and dialogue, it made up with emotion. Rose and Jack's love affair is forbidden because they of different classes. Despite this, they fall deeply in love. Romanticism champions a sense of fierce individualism. Romanticism rejected the restraints of society, propriety, and decorum. Rose realized that she was living in a very refined, very elegant cage and felt trapped. Her meeting of Jack and their subsequent love affair broke all the rules of proper society. In this way, their love affair embodied the rebellious attitudes of individualism, deriving from Romanticism.
When the ship starts to sink, Rose's fiance Cal and his manservant try to separate the couple and kill Jack. Many audience members reportedly cried while watching the film. Titanic's soundtrack helped to heighten the emotional effects of the film. The story itself, an account of the deaths of hundreds of people, is already heavy with emotion. The film, however, strives to highlight and strengthen the impact of these deaths through the use of slow motion and sad music. Like many other Romantic works, the focus is on emotions above analyzation. The powerful emotions it makes us feel is Titanic's greatest strength.
When the ship starts to sink, Rose's fiance Cal and his manservant try to separate the couple and kill Jack. Many audience members reportedly cried while watching the film. Titanic's soundtrack helped to heighten the emotional effects of the film. The story itself, an account of the deaths of hundreds of people, is already heavy with emotion. The film, however, strives to highlight and strengthen the impact of these deaths through the use of slow motion and sad music. Like many other Romantic works, the focus is on emotions above analyzation. The powerful emotions it makes us feel is Titanic's greatest strength.
From the final scene of Titanic.