Film Review: Titanic (re-released in 3D)

Titanic. Rated M (mature themes and coarse language). 195 minutes. Written and directed by James Cameron.

Verdict: ‘Pop-up’ Titanic betrays the splendid original, but it’s an undeniable pleasure to see it on the big screen where it belongs.

Following its original release in 1997, James Cameron’s epic telling of the fate of the legendary, ‘unsinkable’ RMS Titanic went on to create motion picture history. Until Mr Cameron’s Avatar (2009), Titanic was the highest-grossing film of all time – raking in over $2 billion dollars in box office receipts worldwide. Titanic was also nominated for a record-equalling fourteen Academy Awards (a record shared with All About Eve), of which it won eleven (as did Ben-Hur and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King), including Best Picture. Its stars – Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet – were catapulted to unequivocal movie stardom.

Re-released in retrofitted 3D to coincide with the centenary of the ill-fated ship’s catastrophic maiden voyage, Titanic remains a stunning cinematic achievement. Apart from providing some younger audience members with the opportunity to see it on the big screen for the first time, the timely re-release provides others of us with the opportunity to revisit an old friend – and Titanic (in 3D or not) demands to be seen at least once in the cinema.

The success of the film in 3D will depend entirely on how comfortable you are with the format – and while it certainly adds additional complex layers of potent intimacy with the characters who you feel as though you are sitting and/or standing amongst, the film’s panoramic grandeur (particularly throughout the spectacular sinking sequences) is completely muted. By its nature, 3D dictates how we view a film and, out of necessity, reduces our ability to take in the whole of the screen. Instead, the format forces us to look toward the centre of the screen in order to appreciate the scale of the multi-dimensional layers that define the increased sense of our proximity to it.

If Titanic had not been such a gloriously-realised film of rich detail and composition in the first place, the 3D might have been a welcome new addition. That this ‘pop-up book’ version becomes something Mr Cameron is determined we should experience as opposed to witness, ultimately reduces – and betrays – the original’s magnificent, engrossing cinematic scale.

This review was commissioned by the Geraldton Newspaper Group.