What works for one doesn't work for others. I thought Cameron conveyed the magnitude of the sinking quite well where it counted...in "Ghosts of the Abyss." With the ship breaking apart in the background, he did not linger on vignettes of actors playing out death scenes, but rather ran the images of actual victims in life past the camera. Very powerful, in my opinion.
His scenes in the mass market entertainment film, "Titanic?" I think that he gave the bulk of the audience what they wanted...at least, that's what I gathered from the majority of comments afterward. Try as some might to critique it as such, "Titanic" was never meant to be a documentary...it was a love story aimed more at young women than hard-core Titanic enthusiasts.
Then why did Cameron make such a big deal about the authenticity of the film's details? I think many of Cameron's critics overlook the fact that the man is genuinely and passionately caught up in the Titanic story. My perception -- and I could be wrong -- is that his reasons for re-creating the ship stemmed more from his own obsession with the story than from the desire to make a film. Without the film, though, Cameron was limited in what he could do, so he had to give the studio what it wanted in order to get what he wanted. What would any of us do if we had the ability to do the same? Cameron was able to use his reputation as a director and the potential of a schamltzy love story as vehicles to pull together the resources that allowed him to dive on the wreck, explore the interior, attract the best Titanic experts and re-create the ship. He's like one of us, but with the wherewithal to bring to life things that we can only chat about. Part of that wherewithal included compromise...Cameron knew that in order to convince the studio to cough up the millions he needed to re-create the disaster, he had to give his Hollywood backers what they wanted. Was "Titanic" a product of Hollywood? Yes, it was...after all, they paid for it. Luckily of us, "Titanic" gave Cameron more influence to pursue his passion his own way. If you want to see something that is more a product of Cameron's obsession with the ship's history than it is of Hollywood, look at "Ghosts of the Abyss."
If we were to forget about the much-maligned love story for a moment and concentrate on the supposedly factual portrayals in "Titanic," we are left with the debate about Cameron's interpretation of events. I don't know what I can say about that. I daresay that if any one of us brought our theories to life, it would be immediately assaulted by others...imagine, for instance, the criticism if someone even as expert as Dave Billnitzer made a movie about the Californian. No matter how solid his portrayal, he would never please everyone. Or, to take another tack, what if one of Captain Collins's books was given screen treatment? What if a Titanic film showed a grounding event, Margaret Brown's stateroom on B Deck (or D Deck), or Murdoch heroically working the falls until swept away by the water? There will always be people who would cry foul. There is not a single portrayal of historical events in the Titanic story that could ever be made that would escape criticism in this or any other Titanic forum. People may not agree with Cameron's interpretation and portrayal of historical events, and that makes for continued discussion. However, I do know that Cameron told his advisors that he would never go against documented proof, even when filming his fictional story, and as far as I can tell, he remained true to his word.
"Titanic" was exactly what the studio wanted (it seems to me that people often overlook the influence that studios have in movie-making, especially when directors are working to their budget). "Titanic" was evidently what millions of people around the world wanted, judging by the box office receipts. "Titanic" certainly wasn't Cameron's last word on the subject; hence, "Ghosts of the Abyss." Look at the difference between the two films and you might see what I'm driving at. GotA was not intended to be mass market entertainment. If you want my personal opinion, I don't think that Cameron cared if GotA made money or not...he concentrated more on two things: to 1) exercise his new technology to explore the wreck and display it in a new format and 2) share what he learned with the public. Unlike "Titanic," he had Don Lynch and Ken Marschall -- among others -- with him on the expedition, during filming, and throughout post-production to advise him on how to get the most out of the information that could be extracted from the wreck. Even though Walden Media people were around to watch Cameron work, they didn't put the pressure on him like the Fox people did during "Titanic." GotA was a better film for Titanic enthusiasts/historians than "Titanic," just as Cameron intended. But people continue to concentrate on "Titanic" for some reason...maybe because it was a bigger movie than GotA?
I've gone beyond the scope of this thread, responding mainly to general criticism of Cameron that has been expressed in other threads. Because of this, I'll probably attract Cameron critics to this discussion, which will throw the entire thread off the original intent. So, before that happens, I'll address the original point...that of death in movies.
History shows that people are attracted to disaster films. I would wager that everyone here in this forum would pay good money to see an earthquake tear apart L.A., a San Francisco high-rise catch on fire, or an ocean liner get turned over by a freak seismic wave. Watching fictional people die is a thrill...even when we get uncomfortably close, as in the new film, "Open Water." It's tricky when a fictional portrayal involves real people, like in "Titanic." Because any re-creation of an historical event is by its very nature fictional, there is no way to avoid criticism. If you think "Titanic" is an isolated example, think again. Because of my WW2 re-enacting, I have been party to debates over the authenticity of (re-enactor favourites) "Band of Brothers," "Cross of Iron," and "Saving Private Ryan," among others. The debates there are as passionately fought as any here in this forum, and the closer to the portrayals of actual personalities one gets, the hotter the debate. People argue not over the truth, but rather each others' perception of the truth. It gets to the point where I just want those who enjoy the films to enjoy them in peace and those who hate the films to move along to something that they will like. As far as the truth is concerned...I'll determine that for myself, thank you very much. I won't learn my history from mass market entertainment. Or, to put it another way, I won't confuse what I see on the screen to be actual history, even though the actor is all dressed up to look and act like a specific person (Tom Selleck as General Eisenhower?). In the portrayal of death in Cameron's "Titanic," those people aren't any more real to me than the ones on the S.S. Poseidon, so what do I care if a CG figure hits a propeller in his fall from the stern? We don't even know if that happened in real life. It affected me more when the photo of the actual Goodwin family faded into a re-enactment of the sinking in GotA...a vehicle that would only work in a documentary, not a fictional love story. What helped make death so uncomfortable in "Open Water" was not just the lurking, random danger beneath the surface of the water, but also the knowledge that the story was based on true events. Even so, it was a fictional story, leaving one to wonder what really happened in the true incident. I guess that if I really wanted to, I could research the incident and try to re-construct the real divers' last moments, but I was entertained enough, thank you very much, by the fictional characters.
My final point is this: What works for one doesn't work for others. As long as we are not talking about an actual death, or actual suffering, being filmed for our entertainment, then people can say what they will. Re-enactments are always filtered through the perceptions of the artist and the audience, so it's not like we are arguing over actual history.
Needless to say, disaster films are profitable because they appeal to the voyeuristic urges in many people. What does that say about us?
I could go on and say that even historical footage -- especially if it includes death -- can be, and often is, manipulated toward a particular conclusion by editors with an agenda that could be at odds with the truth, but that is a topic for another day.
Parks
