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Message: [QUOTE="Inger Sheil, post: 160850, member: 139659"] I think you're right there with the archetypal character angle, Fi. As specific characters, I had problems with Jack and Rose - they seemed insubstantive, and their storyline was rather trite (not helped at all by poor dialogue). However, Cameron stated in at least one interview that I read that they weren't meant to be viewed as specific individuals. I find them more acceptable as basic archetypes - not even as representative socio-economic types (because they're a bit too cliched for that), but more broadly as something elemental in the myths and legends that reveal aspects of the human psyche. It is one facet of the Romeo and Juliet story (same initials, but with a gender reverse) that they fulfill a similar function. Star-cross'd lovers and their piteous overthrow still 'speak' to us, and there's something deeply appealing to the young in particular in the R&J figures of myth. Jack and Rose have little appeal to me as individuals - the stories of some of the real people aboard the ship have a depth, richness, colour and immediacy that renders their fictional counterparts as rather pallid, anaemic, sketchy figures. However, in an abstract sense - as touchstones for something else (the pasteboard mask Melville wrote about), they make more sense and don't strike such a jarring note. That's my honest response, if perhaps a bit ambivalent. I hope you stay around as well, and share what struck such a powerful chord with you personally about whatever aspect of the event or its cultural manifestations - such as the movie - that appeals to you. [/QUOTE]

Verification: In which year did the Titanic sail?