Titanic (1997)
Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Bill Paxton, Billy Zane
based a screenplay by director James Cameron,
whose fictional love story is intertwined with a chronicle of the April
1912 Titanic sinking |
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Real
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Bernard Hill
Born:
December 17, 1944
Birthplace: Manchester, England, UK |
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Captain Edward John Smith
Born: January 27, 1850
Birthplace: Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, England
Died: April 15, 1912, Atlantic Ocean
(perished during sinking of RMS Titanic)
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Kathy Bates
Born:
June 28, 1948
Birthplace: Memphis, Tennessee, USA |
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Margaret "Molly" Brown
Born: July 18, 1867
Birthplace: Hannibal, Missouri
Died: October 26, 1932 Barbizon Hotel, New York City (brain tumor)
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Eric Braeden
Born:
April 3, 1941
Birthplace: Kiel, Germany |
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John Jacob Astor
Born: July 13, 1864
Birthplace: Rhinebeck, New York
Died: April 15, 1912 Atlantic Ocean (perished in Titanic disaster)
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Victor Garber
Born:
March 16, 1949
Birthplace: London, Ontario, Canada |
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Thomas Andrews
Born: February 7, 1873
Birthplace: Comber, County Down, Ireland
Died: April 15, 1912 Atlantic Ocean (perished in Titanic sinking)
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Jonathan Hyde
Born:
May 21, 1947
Birthplace: Brisbane, Australia |
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Bruce Ismay
Born: December 12, 1862
Birthplace: Crosby, Merseyside, England
Died: October 15, 1937 Liverpool, England (cerebral thrombosis)
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"When anyone asks me how I can best describe
my experience in nearly forty years at sea, I merely say, uneventful. Of
course there have been winter gales, and storms and fog and the like.
But in all my experience, I have never been in any accident… or any sort
worth speaking about. I have seen but one vessel in distress in all my
years at sea. I never saw a wreck and never have been wrecked nor was I
ever in any predicament that threatened to end in disaster of any sort." - Captain E.J. Smith, Captain of the RMS Titanic
Questioning the Story:
Were Jack and Rose based on real people?

No.
Jack Dawson and Rose DeWitt Bukater, portrayed in the movie by Leonardo
DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, are almost entirely fictional characters
(James Cameron modeled the character of Rose after American artist
Beatrice Wood, who had no connection to Titanic history).
The movie's love story is also fiction. It was created by
Titanic
screenwriter and director James Cameron. In addition to Rose and Jack, a
handful of other characters associated with them are fictional as well.
They include Rose's fiancé Caledon 'Cal' Hockley (Billy Zane), her
mother Ruth (Frances Fisher),
Cal's valet Spicer Lovejoy (David Warner), and the third class
passengers, who include Jack's friends Fabrizio (Danny Nucci) and Tommy
(Jason Barry). Some of the third class passengers were modeled after
real people.
I heard there was a J. Dawson on board the Titanic, is that true?

Yes.
A man who signed his name J. Dawson did board the Titanic. However, the
J. stood for Joseph, not Jack. Born in Dublin, Joseph Dawson was a
member of the Titanic crew. He worked as a coal trimmer (it was his job
to even out the piles of coal that were shoveled into the ship's
furnaces). James Cameron said that he was not aware of Joseph Dawson
until after finishing his
Titanic screenplay. Still, lovestruck
fans of the 1997 movie ventured to J. Dawson's grave in
Halifax, Nova Scotia, where they left cinema stubs, personal
photos, and pictures of Leonardo DiCaprio (the exact burial location is
Grave 227 in Fairview Lawn Cemetery, Halifax, Nova Scotia). Another
coincidental character created by James Cameron was Jack's Irish friend
Tommy Ryan (Jason Barry). The ship's manifest lists a Thomas Ryan, a
27-year-old steward from third class whose body, if recovered, was never
identified.
Who sketched Jack's drawing of Rose that we see in the movie Titanic?

Director
James Cameron did the sketch of Rose (Kate Winslet) wearing the
necklace. It is actually Cameron's hand, not Leonardo DiCaprio's, that
we see sketching Rose in the movie. James Cameron also drew all of the
pictures in Jack's sketchbook.
Were the movie's underwater shots of the Titanic wreckage real?
Yes. Most of the underwater shots of the Titanic wreckage are real. In 1995, James Cameron hired the Russian vessel
Akademik Mstislav Keldysh
and its two submersibles. He made a total of twelve dives to film the
underwater close-ups at a depth of 12,500 feet below the North Atlantic.
Special cameras and housings were designed to withstand the 6,000
pounds per square inch of water pressure. Each dive lasted approximately
fifteen hours, but the cameras could only store 500 feet of film, which
meant that only twelve minutes of footage could be shot per dive. As a
result, a few of the underwater shots had to be faked.
Were any of Pablo Picasso's paintings lost with the Titanic?
No. After Rose (Kate Winslet) boards the ship in the movie, we
see her displaying authentic paintings by the then barely-known painter,
Pablo Picasso. Cal (Billy Zane) comments that the artist will never
amount to anything. This is an obvious point of humor in the movie, but
it also raises the question as to whether or not these paintings were in
fact part of Titanic history. The answer is no.
One of the paintings shown in the movie is Picasso's "Les
Demoiselles d'Avignon" (
shown here), which depicts five prostitutes in a brothel. It is currently on display at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.
Were there any black passengers on board the Titanic?

Yes.
Joseph Phillippe Lemercier Laroche was the only black man to perish in
the Titanic sinking. Laroche, shown on the right in a family photo, was
on board with his pregnant wife Juliette and their two young daughters.
The story of this interracial family did not become widely known until
three years after the movie's release, when the Chicago Museum of
Science & Industry and the Titanic Historical Society featured the
information as part of a Titanic exhibit.
Joseph Laroche was born in Haiti in 1889 into a powerful family —
his uncle, Dessalines M. Cincinnatus Leconte, was the president of
Haiti.
When he was fifteen, Joseph Laroche left Haiti to study
engineering in Beauvais, France. Several years later, he met Juliette
Lafargue, the 22-year-old daughter of a local wine seller. The two
eventually married. Despite having an engineering degree, Joseph's skin
color left him unable to find employment in France. The Laroches decided
to return to Haiti and booked second-class reservations on the Titanic.
After the ship struck an iceberg, Joseph loaded his wife and children
onto a lifeboat and he went down with the ship. His body was never
recovered. Shortly
before Christmas of that year, Juliette Laroche gave birth to
their son, Joseph Laroche Jr. Juliette never remarried.
Did Bruce Ismay really encourage Captain Smith to go faster?
During the U.S. Senate's Inquiry into the disaster, Bruce Ismay,
the Managing Director of the White Star Line, said the following, "I
understand it has been stated that the ship was going at full speed. The
ship never had been at full speed. The full speed of the ship is 78
revolutions. She works up to 80. So far as I am aware, she never
exceeded 75 revolutions. She had not all her boilers on. None of the
single-ended boilers were on." Ismay said that it was their intention to
work the ship up to its full speed of 80 revolutions either on the next
day (Monday) or two days later (Tuesday), depending on the weather.
Surviving passengers stated that they heard Bruce Ismay
pressuring Captain Edward J. Smith to go faster, with one passenger even
stating that he saw Ismay flaunting an iceberg warning during dinner.
However, none of the surviving officers supported these accusations, and
survivor testimony from some passengers was considered unreliable and
at worst imaginative. Bruce Ismay was crucified by the newspapers for
leaving the ship, and he quickly became a common target upon which to
place blame.
Yet, it is also possible that the testimony from the surviving
officers, exonerating Ismay, was given in the best interest of White
Star Line.
Did pieces of ice from the iceberg really land on the promenade deck?
Yes. Mrs. Churchill Candee, of Washington, said the following
about the ice, "The first thing I recall was one of the crew appearing
with pieces of ice in his hands. He said he had gathered them from the
bow of the boat. Some of the passengers were inclined to believe he was
joking. But soon the situation dawned on all of us." Survivor William
Lucas reported seeing "about a couple of tons" of ice "on the forewell
[deck] on the starboard side" of the ship.
Fourth Officer Joseph Groves Boxhall said that he found "a little
ice in the well deck covering a space of about three or four feet from
the bulwarks right along the well deck, small stuff."
Did the Titanic's band continue to play as the ship went under?

Yes.
33-year-old Wallace Henry Hartley, a violinist, was the bandleader on
the Titanic. Hartley (left) had a fiancée in Boston Spa, near Wetherby
in Yorkshire, and he had spent time with her before leaving on the
Titanic. After the ship struck an iceberg, Wallace Hartley assembled his
eight-man band, and they eventually ended up on the Boat Deck near the
entrance to the Grand Staircase. There, they played ragtime and waltzes.
Specifically, survivors reported them playing "Alexander's
Ragtime Band" and "In the Shadows". No one is certain what the last song
was that the band played as the ship went down.
Newspapers reported that it was "Nearer, My God, To Thee" while
some survivors said the tune was "Song d'Automne". All of the band
members perished in the Titanic sinking. Wallace Hartley's body was
recovered on May 4, 1912 by the cable ship
Mackay-Bennett. Thousands of mourners lined the streets during his funeral procession in Colne, Lancashire, north-west of England.
See a picture of Wallace Hartley's funeral procession. Jonathan Evans Jones, the actor who portrayed Wallace Hartley in James Cameron's
Titanic movie, is a professional violinist.
Were the third class passengers really locked below as the movie Titanic suggests?
Yes, but not exactly in the way that the film implies. Titanic
history tells us that gates did exist which barred the third class
passengers from the other passengers. However, these gates weren't in
place to stop a third class passenger from taking a first class
passenger's seat on a lifeboat. Instead, the gates were in place as a
regulatory measure to prevent the "less cleanly" third class passengers
from transmitting diseases and infections to the others. This would save
time when the ship arrived in New York, as only the third class
passengers would need a health inspection.
At the time of the sinking, some stewards kept
gates locked waiting for instructions, while others allowed women and
children to the upper decks. As a result of poor communication from the
upper decks, the dire reality of the situation was never conveyed.
The crew failed to search for passengers in the cabins and common
areas, and the fact that some third class passengers did not speak
English, also presented a problem. As a result, many of the third class
passengers were left to fend for themselves. Only 25 percent of the
third class passengers survived the disaster.
Did Officer Murdoch really commit suicide after shooting passengers and accepting a bribe?

After the release of James Cameron's 1997 movie
Titanic,
Officer William Murdoch's surviving relatives, other historians, and
people from Murdoch's hometown of Dalbeattie, Scotland were angered over
Cameron's decisive portrayal of First Officer Murdoch (right).
In the film, he turns his gun on himself after shooting two
passengers who are rushing a lifeboat. Based on witness testimony,
historians are fairly certain that an officer did commit suicide, but it
can't be said with absolute certainty that it was First Officer
Murdoch.
Also, there is no evidence to suggest that Murdoch ever took a
bribe. James Cameron likely put the bribe in the film to show Cal's
(Billy Zane) lack of integrity rather than Murdoch's. Studio executives
flew to Murdoch's hometown where they issued an apology and made an
$8,500 donation to Murdoch's memorial fund.
Did one of Titanic's giant funnels really crash down into the water?
Yes. This scene in the movie accurately depicts Titanic history.
As the bridge of the ship sunk below the surface, the first funnel fell
forward into the water, crashing onto some of the swimmers (in the
movie, we see it crash down onto Jack's fictional friend, Fabrizio). The
rush of water from the funnel's splash washed collapsibles A and B
away, thrusting their occupants into the icy waters. It is believed that
millionaire John Jacob Astor was killed by the falling forward funnel.
When his body was found, it was badly crushed and covered in soot.
Authorities used the initials "J.J.A." on
the collar of his brown flannel shirt to positively identify him.
He had been on board with his nineteen-year-old bride Madeline, who
survived the disaster.
See a collage of John and Madeline Astor.
While traveling on their honeymoon, Madeline became pregnant with their
son, and she wanted to return home to have the baby in the United
States. They booked a first class passage on the RMS Titanic.
Did some of the passengers choose to go down with the ship?

Yes. Near the end of the movie
Titanic,
we see an old couple embracing in bed as water pours into their cabin.
The couple is first class passengers Isador and Ida Straus (left).
Isador was the co-owner of Macy's department store. In real life, Isador
and Ida were both offered a place on Lifeboat No. 8, but Isador chose
to stay on the Titanic so long as there were women who remained on the
ship. Ida refused to abandon her husband.
Witnesses on the deck and in Lifeboat No. 8 heard Ida tell her
husband, "We have been living together for many years. Where you go, I
go." The couple was last seen sitting on a pair of deck chairs (not
lying in bed like in the movie). Only Isador's body was recovered and
identified.
Did Captain Smith really go into the bridge to await his fate?
In Robert Ballard's book,
The Discovery of the Titanic, he
claims that Captain Smith went into the bridge to await his fate at
2:17 A.M., three minutes before the ship went under completely.
View a photo of Captain Smith.
This may have been partially based on the account of Philadelphia
banker Robert W. Daniel, who claimed that just before he jumped into the
water, he saw Captain Smith on the bridge, which was slowly being
swallowed by the icy sea. James Cameron supports this account in his
1997 movie
Titanic by showing Captain Smith enter the bridge and
grasp the wheel as water crashes in.
While some survivors testified that they saw Captain Smith enter
the bridge, other Titanic survivors said that they saw Captain Smith in
the water with a life jacket. It is possible that he may have jumped
from the bridge area as the ship went down. A boy who was one of the
last children to leave the ship told Dr. J.F. Kemp, a passenger on the
Carpathia, that "Captain Smith put a pistol to his head and then fell
down." Other witnesses reported having seen Captain Smith commit suicide
as well. Surviving crewmen vigorously denied the possibility. His body
was never recovered.
Did the Titanic's lights continue to burn until just before the ship went under?
Yes. Dr. Washington Dodge, a Titanic survivor who observed the
ship's final moments from a lifeboat, said the following in an April 20,
1912
San Francisco Bulletin article, "We saw the sinking of the
vessel. The lights continued burning all along its starboard side until
the moment of its downward plunge. After that a series of terrific
explosions occurred, I suppose either from the boilers or weakened
bulkheads." This account is nearly identical to what is shown in the
movie.
Did the Titanic really break apart as it sunk?
Yes. For years, whether the Titanic broke apart as it went under
was a highly debated element of Titanic history. Some survivors
testified that the ship did break apart as it sunk, while others said
that it went under intact. Much of the uncertainty surrounding this was
put to rest in 1985 when the wreck of the Titanic was discovered in two
separate portions on the sea bottom. It is very likely that the ship
broke apart much like the movie's depiction.
Were any of the passengers rescued from the water like Rose?

Yes.
Only two of the sixteen lifeboats went back to pick up survivors, and
they ended up saving six. The first was Quartermaster Perkis in Lifeboat
4, who was able to pull 5 people from the water but only 3 survived.
The second boat was Lifeboat 14 headed by Fifth Officer Harold
Lowe (right), who had gathered nearby lifeboats together to free up room
in one of them. When Lifeboat 14 returned to where the Titanic had sunk
(approximately 150 yards away),
Officer Lowe and a working crew of six men picked up four
survivors from the water. One of the four men found in the water, a
William F. Hoyt from New York, died in the lifeboat. A British Inquiry
asked Officer Lowe why he didn't return more quickly to help the people
in the water. In his testimony, Harold Lowe responded by saying,
"Because it would have been suicide to go back there until the people
had thinned out." Lowe further stated,
"...it would have been useless to try it, because a drowning man
clings at anything." Lowe feared that the large number of people in the
water would have swamped or overturned the lifeboat. It is Officer
Lowe's boat that saves Rose (Kate Winslet) in the film.
How did Margaret Brown get the nickname "Unsinkable Molly Brown"?
When the
Carpathia arrived at New York's pier 54, over
30,000 people, including reporters, clamored to interview the Titanic
survivors. When reporters asked Margaret Brown to what she attributed
her survival, Margaret replied, "Typical Brown luck. We're unsinkable."
Reporters began referring to her as the "Unsinkable Mrs. Brown".
See a photo collage of Margaret "Molly" Brown.
The nickname of "Molly" was a Hollywood invention created years
later in the 1930s. It was part of a highly fictional tale that became
the basis for the 1960 Broadway musical,
The Unsinkable Molly Brown. In the movie
Titanic,
we get a glimpse of the friendship between Margaret Brown and John
Jacob Astor. Before boarding the ship, Margaret had been traveling with
J.J. Astor and his wife Madeline in Cairo, Egypt. Margaret booked
a First Class passage on the Titanic after learning that her grandson
Lawrence was ill.
How long could the people have remained alive in the water?

On
the night of the Titanic sinking, the temperature of the salt water was
likely around 28° F. The human body loses heat to the water about 30
times faster than it does to the air. When the core body temperature
falls to approximately 89° F, a decrease in consciousness occurs. If the
core temperature cools to below 86° F, then heart failure becomes a
major concern, as it is the most common cause of hypothermia-related
deaths.
The people in the bone chilling 28° water above the sinking
Titanic would have had anywhere from several minutes to an hour to live,
depending on their physical condition and how much they flailed. Some
people in the water might have believed that swimming would help their
body to generate heat. In reality, people who swam or moved around a lot
would have lost heat 35-50% faster and been susceptible to exhaustion.
There were even several people who died from hypothermia in the Titanic
lifeboats, because they were open and gave no protection against the
cold.
Regulations have since been put in place that require lifeboats
to be fully or partially enclosed.
How many people were rescued by the Carpathia?
The Cunard liner Carpathia, under the command of Captain Arthur
Rostron, was only fifty-eight miles away when Titanic sent her distress
call at 12:25 A.M. It took the Carpathia four hours to reach the
Titanic's position.
View a photo of the Titanic's lifeboats approaching the Carpathia.
In all, 711 passengers were rescued and over 1500 perished in the
disaster.
Among the passengers rescued were 58 men; all of whom came under
public scrutiny after news broke that approximately 150 women and
children died (mostly from Second and Third class). Titanic survivor
Adolphe Saalfeld said of the Carpathia,
"The Captain and Officers of the Carpathia did all that was
possible to make us comfortable, and to those that were sick or injured;
they gave their most tender care. The icebergs were huge and the
weather extremely rough on the voyage to New York."
Did Bruce Ismay really sneak into a lifeboat like in the movie Titanic?
No. There are no reports of Bruce Ismay disguising himself as a
woman to sneak into a lifeboat as he does in the movie. However, First
Class Passenger Jack Thayer said that he saw Bruce Ismay pushing his way
into Collapsible C. Thayer "did not blame him," because from what
Thayer could see, "It was really every man for himself." Of the 58 men
who survived, Bruce Ismay, the Managing Director of the White Star Line,
received the most criticism, and in 1913,
Ismay resigned from his job and from public life. London society
labeled Bruce Ismay one of the biggest cowards in history, and both the
American and English press ruthlessly attacked him. Some papers even
published cartoons of Ismay deserting the ship.
Was the Heart of the Ocean (Coeur de la Mer) a real diamond?

No.
The Heart of the Ocean diamond is a fictional device that James Cameron
added to the plot in order to give Brock Lovett (Bill Paxton) a reason
to hear Rose's story. The Heart of the Ocean is based on the famous Hope
Diamond that King Louis XVI of France gave to Marie Antoinette to add
to her jewelry collection.
The Hope Diamond is currently on display at the Smithsonian
Natural History Museum in Washington, D.C. It holds no place in Titanic
history. As a result of moviegoer fantasies surrounding the fictional
Heart of the Ocean, the Asprey & Garrard jewelry company decided
to make a real Heart of the Ocean diamond necklace. The 170-carat
sapphire, surrounded by sixty-five 30-carat diamonds, was worn by
Celine Dion during her performance of "My Heart Will Go On" at the 1998
Academy Awards Ceremony. The necklace later sold at a benefit auction
for $2.2 million.
Can I visit the Titanic movie set?
Yes. The set, located at Fox's Baja Studios in
Rosarito Beach, Mexico, still exists. The nearly full-scale Titanic
replica created for the film was badly damaged when the filmmakers
submerged it underwater to recreate the sinking. It was dismantled after
filming wrapped. However, several of the Titanic interiors are still
there, including Rose's 1st class stateroom, Jack's 3rd class stateroom,
the purser's office (where Jack was handcuffed to the pipe), the
outside deck, and the Palm Court (dining) room. Tours are available to
the public.
Like the original ship, the replica (when it
existed) was 60 feet from the boat deck to the water. Certain repetitive
lengthwise sections of the ship were omitted, which made it shorter
than the original 882.5 foot ship. The movie ship had only been
completed on one side. As a result, there are several scenes in which
the ship is reversed, such as in the "I'm the king of the world" scene
where the crew galley skylight gives the reversal away. Very few of the
ship's interiors were built into the replica's framework itself. Most
were built on neighboring sound stages. The set designs, costumes and
the ship itself were meticulously recreated.
View a comparison photo of Titanic's Grand Staircase. In several cases, James Cameron even hired the original manufacturers to reproduce such things as carpets and lifeboat davits.
Video Footage of the real Titanic
In our first selection below, take a journey into
history by watching a compilation of real Titanic video footage. See the
actual ship and the real Captain Edward J. Smith on the bridge prior to
leaving. Witness the aftermath as the Carpathia returns with survivors.
 | Historic Titanic Video Footage View old footage of the real ship itself.
This is the 1912 version of the story told
through a collection of surviving Titanic
video clips. Take a trip back in time as
you enjoy this historical and priceless
footage.
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 | Pics from the Titanic Movie Set (Slideshow) Enjoy some behind the scenes Titanic movie
set pics. The slideshow features the
actors, including Leonardo DiCaprio and
Kate Winslet, as well as director James
Cameron. Notice Cameron in the water with
his actors.
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 | Titanic - Carpathia (Deleted Scene) This is a deleted Titanic movie scene,
which shows the Carpathia saving the
surviving Titanic passengers. This clip
can also be found on most of the Special
Edition Titanic DVDs.
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 | Charlie Rose - CAMERON Filmmaker James Cameron is interviewed by
Charlie Rose. Cameron talks about the
journey to bring his enormously successful
movie Titanic to the big screen. James
Cameron interview runtime - 59:26. Date:
Dec. 18, 1997.
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 | Celine Dion - My Heart Will Go On Watch the Celine Dion "My Heart Will
Go On" music video. The song is the
love theme from the movie and is featured
on the Titanic soundtrack. C'mon, admit
it, you've sung it in the shower at least
once. Now you can see it done right.
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