Titanic, as Tom puts it – and I rather agree – is a "big dumb movie." It did what big dumb movies do, and did it well. Like CP, I was the target audience when it came out, and it spoke to me at the time.

That aside, I don't believe that any film will ever have complete historical accuracy.

Period films are retellings, and, by their very nature as art, can't ever capture exactly the essence of the time or event. As iSm has been saying lately, if two people are in the same room, their perspectives on that room and what happens in it will be different. A period filmmaker must take a number of different perspectives meld them together, making assumptions and filling in the gaps with their own fictions.

Real life and film are very different monsters. Real life has all kinds of boring stretches and inconsistencies. So much of our daily lives would deserve to be left on the cutting-room floor. And when an aspect of a story can be fudged in order to create a more compelling narrative, most storytellers choose to fudge it up every time. The majority of the audience won't know, and the majority of them are probably more moved/surprised/intrigued by whatever chocolate-walnut or maple-flavored additions or subtractions the filmmakers make. And often, especially if you're not intimate with the subject, this makes for a better movie experience.

Not to mention that they must appease the executives or hit the road. Donning my industry-cynic hat for a moment, I'll admit that a lot of their choices are informed by what they imagine will play in Peoria.

Take, for instance, the Oscar-winning A Beautiful Mind. It made major historical compromises for the sake of unified, compelling storytelling, How do you show a schizophrenic's aural hallucinations in a compelling way? You make them visual, because film's a visual medium.

And it made further compromises for the sake of its presumed dumb-downer audience. How do you tell a story of a man whose varied actions (illegitimate children, possible homosexual affairs etc) might vilify him in the eyes of paying customers who will be telling their blue-haired friends whether or not it's worth $12 of their social security checks? You change the facts, Max. You display a strong, supportive marriage between John and Alicia Nash, chop out anything that might be presumed a "standard deviation" and avoid alienating your audience. Until they read the book, that is.

Funeral scene. He was dressed as a cop.

Oh ya! I did see that.

In other words, print the legend.

Aw, he's an adorable little thief!

That's all well and good when you're not claiming your film is going to be historically accurate. Cameron stated over and over that his film was going to be as historically accurate as possible. It wasn’t. And what’s more, he knew he it wasn’t. He even acknowledged, after the fact, that he deliberately altered facts for the sake of the story, while at the same time touting how accurate it would be to the press.

Anyway… I’m done hijacking this thread. (I warned you… don’t get me started!) If anyone wants to further the Titanic discussion (ship or movie), start a new thread. I’ll be there.

We've all got our peeves for such things, but at least in this case, as far as historical inaccuracies in "historically accurate" films go, the list you gave barely blips on my radar.

I'm not done hijacking. Things like Murdock's suicide and Nearer My God to Thee are NOT things Cameron made up. There's more chance they're legend as opposed to fact ... but the real facts are NO ONE WHO KNOWS MADE IT OUT ALIVE. So these are things shrouded in the mist of history. It was perfectly legit for Cameron to use the more dramatic possibilities of the possible events, reported by witnesses (though perhaps lacking credibility).

Fudging the exact nationality and career paths of a couple of below-minor characters is also not historical sacrelige.


For that matter, no one knows the Strauss's really died in bed-enbrace together. No one was there. No one knows the captain met his doom alone on the bridge. He just disappeared at one point (and various legends have him doing various things), but it's widely assumed ... and only assumed he died alone on the bridge when it went down.

Can you fault Cameron for using these two elements? They are more likely, but no more "confirmed" than Murdoch not shooting himself, and the band playing Autumn as their final number.

Wow, quite the smack down, as you're an Honored Fellow of the Film Nit Pickers Assn., correct?





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You suck :p