2 posts tagged “titanic”
Nobody wonders how A Night to Remember ends. The story of the Titanic has been researched in great detail , and thanks to Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet even the unwashed masses know about the Titanic. So I didn't want to see this movie to learn anything new. There's nobody famous in this film, either, so I wasn't watching it for a particular actor. I wanted to see the 1958 movie A Night to Remember because I read Walter Lord's book several times as a child.
Unfortunately, the book was much better than the movie; the latter was almost boring. The book was fascinating, with stories of people from all over the ship. The movie focused on a few people, condensed elaborate stories into two-second sound bites, and - perhaps worst of all - didn't name anybody! I found it extremely frustrating to wonder who this so-and-so was who was yelling at the captain - was it Ismay? They didn't even give Lightoller a name until well into the movie; I had guessed who he was in the first scenes (he mentions being Second Officer, and I knew who that was), and I caught somebody calling him "Lights" a little later on, but you didn't hear "Lightoller" for a long time. I don't remember hearing anybody address the Captain by name, ever. I figured out who was Molly Brown, of course, but many of the others were a mystery for most of the movie. (It didn't help that the DVD has neither captions nor subtitles.)
I'm glad I saw it because I like the Titanic story and I want to have seen as much about it as possible, but this production wasn't particularly interesting. Ah well. Did you know there are still three Titanic survivors alive today?
I rented Titanica from Netflix because I hadn't seen it in about a million years. It was originally an IMAX movie, so it didn't quite translate well to the small screen, but it was still enjoyable. The problem with IMAX documentaries on DVD is that the sweeping vistas deliberately included for IMAX presentations don't really mean a whole lot on your television screen; instead of a breathtaking larger-than-life view, you've got a regular little view.
I've been interested in the Titanic for many years, since reading Walter Lord's A Night to Remember as a child. I was a fan of Robert Ballard for a while, but he seems to have gone a bit nutty. The scientists on the expeditions shown in Titanica are a bit argumentative (pick up the bag, don't pick up the bag) but they brought back spectacular views using 75,000 watts of light and some of the finest cameras in the world.
Obviously this movie is only for Titanic buffs - I can't think of anyone else who would be interested in it. But given the quality filmmaking (like all other IMAX productions) it is a nice treat for those of us who are interested in the Titanic.
