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Original poster

to think titanic movie is cringy

236 replies

makkapacca · 29/01/2022 16:28

Came out when I was 12 and I loved it but at 36 caught it on tv last night and it is so cringy. Whilst I think Winslet and Leo are great actors their acting in it is cringe although I don't know if it's their inexperience or just the script. Every 2nd line is 'Jack Rose'. I don't get how both were nominated for Oscars for it when it genuinely wasn't good acting by any means on either part and again I think both are genuinely brilliant in their other films.

Watching it is reminiscent of watching 90s Home and Away or just bad teenage tv acting. Yea the effects are great but the script in itself is just so mediocre and so 12 year old girl stuff. It didn't occur to me how little the film actually go into the subject matter of the Titanic like the creation of it and the aftermath of the sinking etc.

The rich in it like Cal and Rose's mum are so 1 dimensional greedy villains which is kind of hypocritical considering how wealthy Cameron himself is, and the poor Irish on 3rd class are just laughably bad and cliche with accents Irish people never have. And I say that as an Irish person myself so no racism.

A critic said after that the only reason it got oscar noms was because of the money it gained and I sort of agree. Again the effects and cinematography were great but the film itself was just a predictable cringe fest.

OP posts:
Oblomov22 · 30/01/2022 07:28

Jack&Rose

74 and 85 times. That someone says Jack or Rose.

dayswithaY · 30/01/2022 07:38

At the time people were a bit snobby about it, it certain wasn't seen as a high brow art house film just a rom com with lots of water.

There's a brilliant podcast called "You Are Good" that has recently made an episode about Titanic, they discuss how they love it despite its faults. One of the hosts is Sarah Marshall from "You're Wrong About".

Kate Winslet used to irritate me but since "Mare of East Town" I think she's phenomenal, so I might rewatch Titanic just to see her.

horizontilting · 30/01/2022 07:55

It could be worse. They could have used the first ending they filmed twitter.com/i/status/1361778751072137222

HufflepuffPride · 30/01/2022 08:05

What is it with posters on Mumsnet saying how much they hate popular films and pointing out all that’s wrong with them? Is it an attempt to look cool and edgy? Well I still like Titanic and I still like Home Alone as well.

As for you who watched it and laughed, well you do realise that really happened and nearly 2,000 people died? But never mind you are so cool and edgy aren’t you 🙄

DaggerIsle · 30/01/2022 08:35

I remember reading Cameron was so obsessed with attention to detail that he had the exact tableware recommissioned only to destroy it when the boat starts to sink.
But then, just to show how rebellious and modern Rose is, she shows off the paintings she has just bought in Paria- all currently in famous museums, some (by Picasso) painted years after the Titanic sank... Hmm
That's when I realised it was going to be a cheesy love story and the Titanic was going to be a side show. And it was.

DaggerIsle · 30/01/2022 08:37

By the way love Home Alone and loads of 'popular films'

When they are well made.
LOTR trilogy for instance- loads of Oscars and commercial success. Great movies and stood the test of time.

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makkapacca · 30/01/2022 08:40

I think it was over-praised by critics at the time - Ebert being a good example. But there were always people who said that the script and story were underwhelming and even silly

but that is my point, it was like the emperor's new clothes and the film was totally overrated by the critics at the time. IU even linked the reviews to see how it was seen as something really profound and deep when it wasn't. The people who called the script out for what it was was a tiny minority back then and the truth only appeared to emerge later.

Also to posters saying this is a quest to hate something popular, it's not. I never said it was an awful film, I said it was a cringe fest and in the so bad it's good zone. My point was that it was not near worthy of the high praise it got back then as some epic masterpiece.

OP posts:
Original poster
makkapacca · 30/01/2022 08:42

Well I still like Titanic and I still like Home Alone as well

yea but home alone wasn't compared to Gone with the Wind.

OP posts:
Pootlepoodle · 30/01/2022 08:58

yea but home alone wasn't compared to Gone with the Wind.

What is with the weird random comparisons? 😂

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makkapacca · 30/01/2022 09:01

What is with the weird random comparisons

because I am making the point that the film was applauded by the masses of critics at the time yet people are brushing this aside.

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XelaM · 30/01/2022 09:03

It's AWFUL

HATED it at the time and really cannot stomach anyone who thinks this was a decent film. It's SO BAD

DrSbaitso · 30/01/2022 09:13

@makkapacca

What is with the weird random comparisons

because I am making the point that the film was applauded by the masses of critics at the time yet people are brushing this aside.

Well, you applauded it at the time too.

It was a big deal at the time. Groundbreaking special effects and films were generally shorter so the length was a big deal. It'll always be relevant for the technical innovation and the fact that it defied the expectations that audiences wouldn’t be able to handle the run time. Two rising starlets and a theme song by one of the biggest female singers of all time. It was a massive commercial success. It was based on a true historical event that has always drawn huge public interest ever since it happened. There were living survivors at the time.

24 years later, it's still in the public consciousness enough to be parodied and featured in memes all the time, and a lot of young people today like it. Why shouldn't they? We did, back then. We might recognise that it isn't exactly a flawless jewel of filmmaking, but it's of its time and it was zeitgeisty.

You seem to want us all to agree that it's just an irredeemable piece of shit. If it had no good points and no appeal, it wouldn't have done so well and it wouldn't remain in our consciousness all these years later.

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makkapacca · 30/01/2022 09:17

Well, you applauded it at the time too

yea but I was 12-a child,pretty much thought that Home and Away was a well acted and quality show. The critics were experienced and mature professionals who should have known better,

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secular39 · 30/01/2022 09:24

This film came out when I was roughly two so about another 10 years down the late since I saw it. But even now, it still gripped me.

But you must have cried at the children being read the bedtime story of going to the land of eternal youth, when we knew they were going to drown

Yes! That gets me every time!

DrSbaitso · 30/01/2022 09:31

@makkapacca

Well, you applauded it at the time too

yea but I was 12-a child,pretty much thought that Home and Away was a well acted and quality show. The critics were experienced and mature professionals who should have known better,

Why? If they all liked the film too, why is it so impossible to believe that it had some sort of appeal? For technical reasons and audience acceptance of the run time alone, it was significant.

You're looking at it in 2022, after Lord of the Rings and a young lifetime of advances in culture and filmmaking. Plenty of people watching it now weren't born when it came out. And you're comparing it to your 12 year old self's reception of it.

I never thought it was a Great Film but I'm not recognising this irredeemable pile of shit that nobody should ever have liked even in 1998.

Fenella2000 · 30/01/2022 09:47

Ugh. I saw it at 12 and was deeply, deeply moved but all the Cool Girls in my class insisted it was shit. “I’m a strong woman who’s going to have a career, I’m not going to cry at silly romantic films”.

Now 36 and I still think it’s a wonderful film and still cry my eyes out. You can all shove it 🤣 The podcast You Are Good did a lovely episode on it recently and host Sarah Marshall has written about it before - www.buzzfeednews.com/article/sarahmarshall/20-years-ago-titanic-took-over-the-world-heres-why

Gone With The Wind is similarly a romantic melodrama, I don’t understand why it’s supposed to be more “highbrow”.

Fenella2000 · 30/01/2022 09:52

Also IT’S NOT ABOUT THE SPACE ON THE RAFT, IT’S ABOUT THE BUOYANCY. A hill I will die on.

HufflepuffPride · 30/01/2022 09:57

@makkapacca

Well I still like Titanic and I still like Home Alone as well

yea but home alone wasn't compared to Gone with the Wind.

Neither was Titanic!😂
TatianaBis · 30/01/2022 09:59

I’ve never managed to sit through more than the first 10 mins.

DrSbaitso · 30/01/2022 10:00

@Fenella2000

Ugh. I saw it at 12 and was deeply, deeply moved but all the Cool Girls in my class insisted it was shit. “I’m a strong woman who’s going to have a career, I’m not going to cry at silly romantic films”.

Now 36 and I still think it’s a wonderful film and still cry my eyes out. You can all shove it 🤣 The podcast You Are Good did a lovely episode on it recently and host Sarah Marshall has written about it before - www.buzzfeednews.com/article/sarahmarshall/20-years-ago-titanic-took-over-the-world-heres-why

Gone With The Wind is similarly a romantic melodrama, I don’t understand why it’s supposed to be more “highbrow”.

GWTW was absolutely groundbreaking cinematically for many reasons and the "love story", such as it is, isn't actually the focus. It needs to be put into its historical context, but it's really a story about survival and adapting to a changing world. Who does, and who doesn't, and what happens. Plus Scarlett O'Hara isn't your standard feisty, good-hearted heroine by a long shot.

It is far more than just a love story. And the love story is not really a common one, from what I can tell.

TatianaBis · 30/01/2022 10:01

I’ve never heard or conceived of Gone with the Wind as highbrow. It’s a much better film though.

zingally · 30/01/2022 10:02

I was the same age as you when it came out, and LOVED it!

Looking back now, it's pretty trite and cheesy. But weren't all 90s films like that?!

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makkapacca · 30/01/2022 10:02

Neither was Titanic!😂

Janet Maslin of The New York Times commented that "Cameron's magnificent Titanic is the first spectacle in decades that honestly invites comparison to Gone With the Wind."[129] Adrian Turner of Radio Times awarded it four stars out of five, stating "Cameron's script wouldn't have sustained Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh for 80 minutes, but, somehow, he and his magical cast revive that old-style studio gloss for three riveting hours."[131]

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Nietzschethehiker · 30/01/2022 10:03

I genuinely do not understand why people like the OP can't just not like something without trying to insist that it's objectively bad. You don't like it now as an adult , so?

It's not really my thing either but why on earth do you need to spend so much effort denigrating it in order to try to get an objective agreement to validate your personal dislike.

You don't like it now and disagree with the reviews. Other people like it. You in fact do not need other people to validate your dislike.

MyCatEatsPrawnCrackers · 30/01/2022 10:10

I have never seen the film so can't comment on that but I remember going to the hairdresser's when it was on at the cinema and she told me that she and three of her friends had dumped their boyfriends after seeing it as they 'weren't as romantic as Jack' Confused

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