by Chris Marshall:
I realized a couple of
things while watching Titanic today. One, it was the first (of
only four total[1]) Best Picture
winners that I saw in a theater. Two, it came out 15 years ago. Holy schlamoly I’m
old. It pains me to remember things so clearly when they happened a decade and
a half ago.
It’s also a perfect showcase for the best and the worst of
James Cameron. From a technical standpoint, it is incredibly well made. The
cinematography, set design, and special effects all hold extremely well all
these years later. But the actual screenplay, despite having a number of
memorable, canonical lines, falls flat most of the time. Especially when Old
Rose is speaking near the end, it sounds more like she’s reading a poem than
actually speaking.
Of course, she was pretty old, and I guess she’d had plenty
of time to think about it. Still, it seems like Cameron’s characters rarely
talk like actual human beings. I think that’s why the Terminator films work so well. Arnold can get away with talking
like a machine because he is a
machine. When Edward Furlong says those horrible lines, not so much.
