Titanic

Ok, today is Valentine's Day, which is a holiday that I completely hate with a passion. I don't understand why people go crazy about showing their loved one how much they love them. You have 365 days of the year to show your loved one how much you love them, why go crazy and show it on Valentine's Day? I'm sorry, but no matter what anyone says, I will never get into Valentine's Day! And to show how much I hate Valentine's Day, I will talk about a film that I hate, yet everyone else seems to love. Come on, we all have those films that we hate but everyone seems to love, and when they ask why, you explain to them. Well...what film am I going to talk about today? How about director James Cameron's highest-grossing film for 12 years before it became the second highest-grossing film of all time: Titanic.

Before everyone starts sending their hate mails about me negatively reviewing Titanic, just calm down and hear me out. Now, I don't hate James Cameron, I think that he is a great director, maybe even one of the greatest. For crying out loud, everyone loves the first two Terminator movies, so that's a good enough reason to like James Cameron. However, Titanic I just couldn't get into, and I'll tell you why. I was nine when I saw this film, and boy was I in for a surprise. The sinking of the Titanic is told by the Old Rose, played by Gloria Stuart. Now, onto my points for hating Titanic. For starters, I just couldn't get into the romance, and I hated it completely. Maybe it's because the romance is similar to my most hated play by William Shakespeare, Romeo & Juliet, which people like to call "The Eternal Love story," but that's a whole another topic, we're talking about Titanic. It's like if James Cameron decided to completely detract from the history of this tragic sinking of the "unsinkable ship," and instead focus on a love story that was irrelevant to the history. Second, Leonardo DiCaprio starring as Jack Dawson. Granted, this is a role that he did when he was younger, and back then, I despised him. He was just a pain to look at every single time he was on screen, and looked like an actor just for the girls to go crazy over. What do you know...girls went crazy for him when this film came out. I had refused to see him in any of his other films for years.  That is until I saw Inception, which he was amazing in. He's probably improved over time, so I guess I'll start liking him, but who knows. Now with Kate Winslet staring alongside DiCaprio as Rose DeWitt Bukater, I have to say was a huge help for me, because she is undeniably one of the hottest British actresses out there. Admit it men, you enjoyed it when she was taking her portrait wearing only the Heart of the Ocean necklace. I will admit, that's probably the only part that I will watch over and over again of the entire film.

Now the length of this film just got really tiring, and it really dragged out, making it a bore. The one scene that really sticks out in my head and I really can't understand is when after the Titanic sinks, Jack and Rose are in the ocean, Rose is on the door, and Jack is still in the ocean. After having a long talk that Rose will die as an old lady warm in her bed, a shipman starts looking around with his flashlight and yells, "IS THERE ANYONE ALIVE OUT THERE!? CAN ANYONE HEAR ME!?" When Rose notices, she starts calling, "COME BACK!" while trying to get Jack to notice, but he dies. Then she tells him, "I'll never let go," and what does she do? She lets him go and he sinks! Talk about a hypocrite. With the remaining passengers that survived, one of them is Rose's stuck-up and snobby, jerk fiancé, Cal, played by Billy Zane. She remains hidden from him after the Titanic sinks, and later finds out that Cal killed himself after he lost all of his money in the Wall Street Crash in 1929. Did somebody say dark twist? Apparently this film was so popular, that the main theme song, "My Heart Will Go On," (which in my opinion has been overused over the years and has died) was sung by none other than the famous Canadian Artist, Celine Dion.

My main reason as to why I can't watch Titanic is because it's too sad. For those of you who don't know, this is based off of a real-life event. The RMS Titanic was a British passenger liner that sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on April 15, 1912. Even though James Cameron made the ship and the crew that controlled the ship real, the passengers weren't real though. We don't know that maybe there was a Jack and a Rose on the ship at that time that may or may not have known one another, but the surviving passengers might remember it, if anyone of them are still alive today. Since this is based off of a real-life event, obviously I would feel sad while watching it. No, I didn't cry, and don't say that I'm denying it because I'm saying it, I honestly did not cry. Still, give me a break, I was only nine at the time, so it would be sad to see all of those people that went on the boat for a vacation and head to another destination, and an iceberg came in and practically killed almost all of them. You want to hear a shocking fact: I was able to sit through this the whole way through....twice. So that says a lot.

There, those are my reasons why Titanic is a movie that I hate, but everyone else seems to love. That doesn't mean that it's a bad movie and I'm saying don't watch it. I'm not one of those people that when I hear if someone were to like or hate a film that I like or hate, I won't go, "You're terrible!" no, I'm not like that. Instead, I would like to hear why they like or hate the film and then give my reasons as to why I either like or hate the film we're talking about. Anyways, I'm going to say Happy Single's Awareness Day everybody, since I hate Valentine's Day, so I'll say an alternative. Stay tuned tomorrow for my third Black History Month film review.