Are you ready to go back to Titanic?

Titanic
Director: James Cameron
Cast: Kate Winslet, Leonardo DiCaprio, Billy Zane, Victor Garber, Kathy Bates, Bill Paxton
Released: December 17, 1997; April 4, 2012
Viewed in theaters: December 24, 1997; January 24, 1998; March 24, 1998; April 7, 2012

Oscar nominations:
Best Picture  (won)
Best Director - James Cameron (won)
Best Actress - Kate Winslet (lost to Helen Hunt for As Good as It Gets)
Best Supporting Actress - Gloria Stewart (lost to Kim Basinger for L.A. Confidential)
Best Cinematography  (won)
Best Art Direction (won)
Best Costume Design (won)
Best Sound (won)
Best Film Editing (won)
Best Sound Effects Editing (won)
Best Visual Effects (won)
Best Make Up (lost to Men in Black)
Best Original Song - "My Heart Will Go On" by Celine Dion (won)
Best Score - James Horner (won)

It's been 84 years and I can still smell the fresh paint.
The china had never been used.
The sheets had never been slept in.
Titanic was called the Ship of Dreams, and it was.
It really was.

Let me preface this review by saying I freaking love this movie. I'm not ashamed to say it! Even though I already saw it three times in the theater when it was first released and have seen it many times on video and DVD, I still wanted to see it again in the theater (even though I couldn't escape the 3-D aspect!) This is the only movie which has been re-released in theaters I've seen that I remember seeing the first time. I saw the re-release of E.T. and the first two (ugh) Star War movies, but I was way too young (or not born yet) to watch the first time around in theaters. 

Even after fifteen years, the special effects still hold up and the story still moves me and the 3-plus hour length never seemed that long to me. Now I'll be the first to admit that it isn't perfect. It had cheesy lines ("a woman's heart is like the ocean - full of secrets!") and a few scenes were unintentionally funny, like when the guy falls off the boat and hits the propellers - that always makes me giggle. :::hangs head in shame:::

It's been fifteen years and I can still remember seeing this movie in the theater for the first time. The date was December 24th, 1997 and I went to see it with my mom. I used my free movie passes. I remember being awed throughout the whole movie, crying my eyes out during several scenes (Rose jumping out of the lifeboat to be with Jack, the montage of people preparing for their inevitable deaths when the orchestra is playing, Rose letting go of Jack and calling for a boat with the whistle). Titanic was called the biggest movie ever and it was. It really was!

This time around, I noticed a few young girls in the theater between the ages of ten and fifteen and it warmed my cold little heart because while it's possible they've seen the movie before on DVD, you knew this was their first time experiencing it in the theater as many of them wouldn't have been born or way too young when it first was released in theaters. No young boys in the theater, though! There were only a couple guys...they were probably being dragged along by their girlfriends or wives! I didn't cry as much as I did the first time I saw it...but I did cry when Rose is on the drifting wood and hears somebody shouting for survivors and starts saying "Come back! Come back" and swims to a dead officer in the water and uses his whistle to get their attention. Yep, that made me cry a little! 

Somebody left the water running!

I absolutely LOVED Kate Winslet's wardrobe in this movie: the white dress with the purple trim and matching hat when she first boards the ship, her beaded red dress when she's going to jump off the ship, but my favorite was the blue dress she wore during the "Jack! I'm flying!" scene. Oh, and speaking of that scene, who hasn't been on a boat and gone to the bow and pretended to "fly" or shout "I'M THE KING OF THE WORLD!" Or is that just me?  Yes, I do that. Luckily, I haven't been on that many boats...

I was seventeen when I saw this movie, exactly in the age bracket that the movie was targeting. I always thought it was cool that I was the same age as Rose. Now, while I thought Leonardo DiCaprio was cute in the movie and while I do think he's a good actor, I was never one of those annoying Leo fangirls. (I think my mom was more enamored with him than I was!) I didn't see the movie in the theater those two (now three!) other times because of him, I saw it again because, as I've said before, I love this movie! 

You know, before I saw this movie, I hated being a redhead. Like, seriously, hated it. I would long to be a blonde or brunette and I was so jealous of my friends with dark or fair hair. But then I saw Kate Winslet with those gorgeous red curls, and I thought, damn, if the female lead in The!Best!Movie!Ever! (which is what I thought at the time, I was only 17 ;-)) has red hair, then red hair must be awesome. So now I'm all like, "Yeah, my hair is awesomel" Of course, Kate Winslet is way prettier than me! She was 22 when this movie came out and want to hear something crazy? The little girl who played Cora ("You're still my best girl, Cora!") is probably the same age now as Kate Winslet was when she was in Titanic. Stuff like that just blows my mind! 

Okay, so my favorite scene of the movie is the one at the very end. Remember, they show Old Rose sleeping, and they pan through her photos (okay, how awesome did Kate Winslet look in those, I especially love the first one - she just has that classic look, some actresses look too modern, but she really does look like she could have been born in another era) and then we see the Titanic underwater, but it morphs into before it sank and the camera pans into that room with the staircase and we see a big group of people - the men in the orchestra, Tommy and Fabrizio, Cora and her father, and I love that Mr. Andrews is the last person we see before Jack. Then of course, it's revealed that Rose is the one who has just entered and she and Jack kiss and everyone claps. Shut up, yes, I love that scene! It still gives me chills! I think she dreamed that, but died right after and is now in "Titanic heaven" with the other people who died on the ship. Yes, that's how I interpreted it!