Titanic turns 25: Bonus cinematic throwback

I hated Titanic once. I just hadn't seen it yet. 

I don't really know why. I know that leading up to its release I wasn't into it. Some big romance movie was not something that I was likely to be into at the time. But I genuinely do not remember why I had real hatred for this thing. It's not like I wasn't a James Cameron fan. I had liked Leonardo DiCaprio in things already. 

Anyway, I blew the movie off. This thing was out for like a month and a half before I ended up seeing it. The circumstances of when and with who I saw it have something to do with the film's importance in my life, but I'm sticking to the film here.

By the time I did see Titanic it had already become a huge sensation and one of the biggest films of all time. It opened well, but not huge, and just stayed at the top of the box office. Week after week after week. It wasn't dethroned until April, so that's over 3 months at the top. That will NEVER happen again. Part of it is that in 1998 studios still kind of took January through March off from big movies.

I saw this movie on January 31st. I remember this because it was a late night showing, so the month changed as I was in there.

But anyway, I went in the greatest of skeptics, and exited with Titanic probably as one of my favorite films of all time.

Look, Titanic has been one of the most seen, most talked about movies of all time. I don't have a whole lot of new stuff to add. But somehow, this film that won a ton of Oscars and is still one of the 5 biggest hits of all time is UNDERrated. 

The film is a sweeping romance. The film is a disaster movie. It brings the very best traits of both.

The first half of it is of course centered around the romance of poor boy Leonardo DiCaprio and rich girl Kate Winslet. For me the key to why this film is so great is that this half of the film really works. I'm never bored by this at all. These two have legendary great chemistry. This was an era where I sometimes knee-jerk hated heartthrob actors, but I never hated Leo. And Winslet is completely irresistible. DiCaprio was a known commodity by this point, and was on his way. Winslet I kind of knew about, but this was probably the first time I sctually saw her in anything. And Jesus, young baby fat Kate Winslet is gorgeous beyond comprehension. 

If this were just a regular romantic drama with these two it would still be a damn fine film. 

But of course it isn't, and of course the ship hits the iceberg and sinks. The back half of the film is quite simply one of the best 90 minutes of film in history. It's exciting, it's expertly staged, and it is an emotional wringer. The film always gets me, and at different moments. Yes, I cry at Titanic. Sue me.

The two leads got all the attention, and deservedly so, but the whole cast is stellar. No, Billy Zane is not stellar, but to be fair he is playing Rose's recollection of her dickhead of a fiancee, so he probably should be one note. Everyone else is great with no qualifiers, with the standouts being Kathy Bates and Victor Garber.

Cameron's approach to making this film ballooned the budget to an absurd level (it's why it was such a presumed flop), but a quarter century later the fx work holds up splendidly. And the 3d transfers look great too.

If you weren't in it in 1998 it's hard to convey what an ongoing huge deal this was. The Celine Dion song (which, sorry, is amazing) was on the radio nonstop. They even made some great.parody mixes on the radio, one with South.Park clips inserted. When they released a 2nd volume.of the soundtrack, that was a big thing. I still remember going to Best Buy on the day the movie was put out on one of those 2 tape videos.

It has endured. It's still one of the 5 biggest movies of all time. It's still popular enough to even get a full 25th anniversary release.

And it's still indeed one of the best films of all time.