Cameron, James
Created | Updated Jan 28, 2002
Movie director; hypnotist.
Despite Mr. Cameron's assertion regarding his kingship over Earth, this has not yet come to pass. Indeed, it is unlikely that he will ever ascend to monarchy, for a number of reasons:
1. It doesn't exist. The world is not ruled by one single person. The practical problems involved are too grandiose to list here.
2. People hate him too much.
The second one requires some measure of explanation. Cameron directed Titanic, the largest-grossing motion picture of all time. However, in the hangover that followed Titanic's success, people started realizing that the audience for the movie consisted almost exclusively of thirteen-year-old girls intent on seeing Leonardo DiCaprio. His charm wears off very quickly, and it is quite unlikely that Titanic will withstand the test of time.
Indeed, a great many moviegoers were dissatisfied even when Titanic was the talk of the town, so to speak. A T-shirt of the era contained the slogan, "It sank. Get over it." Dissatisfaction with the dialogue was one of the major criticisms; on www.imdb.com, the "memorable quotes" section for Titanic contained this bit of brilliant script:
Ruth: So this is the ship they say is unsinkable.
Cal: It is unsinkable. God himself couldn’t sink this ship.
In my further prerusal of the website, I found the following user comments:
"It is appalling that James Cameron hitched his disaster movie to the late-1990s fascination with the R.M.S. Titanic. He can now lump himself with other filmmakers such as Oliver Stone who distort history in an effort to make a film about something other than the historical event they end up teaching the American public about. But, even setting aside my disdain for his gross inaccuracies in Titanic history, and going with my deepest feelings that films are for enjoyment and escapism, this movie lacked the most important part of any film developing characters: I didn't care about Rose or Jack. Rose was spoiled. Jack was a foolish brat. This film also contained the fatal flaw in triangle love stories: I liked the bad guy. Billy Zane, beauty aside, was still the only character who probably was on the Titanic, and the only one I hoped made it off the ship alive. It is better to see the film that should have won the Oscar that year (LA CONFIDENTIAL) rather than waste anymore time even reading more comments about the movie that did win the Oscar."
"There is, in the Motion Picture Academy, a hidden criterion for awards. It's called the Miracle Factor. If a huge, overblown spectacle film production manages to make a killing at the box office and isn't as bad a everyone thought it would be, it acknowledges this miracle with its Best Picture award. This has happened at least twice: in 1952, the malign, Red-baiting Cecil B. De Mille, bullied the corrupt, Red-baiting Academy into presenting him with an Oscar for the ridiculous circus spectacle, Greatest Show on Earth; then, in 1997, an equally corrupt, politically correct Academy presented Titanic with its Oscar.
Titanic deserved an Oscar in only one category - special effects. The story was trite, the acting mediocre (except Leo's, which didn't even get nominated), the editing OK (maybe deserving of an Oscar, since great special effects demand great editing).
Titanic's "beating" out L.A. Confidential is akin to Greatest Show on Earth's "beating" out High Noon. Standing alone, Titanic is just another disaster spectacle. But placed beside a film like L.A. Confidential, Titanic becomes pure garbage.
This view is no better vindicated than by the Academy's choice for Best Picture the following year, Shakespeare in Love. If Titanic got the "Miracle it Wasn't That Bad" Oscar, then Shakespeare in Love was given the "Bad Conscience for Titanic" Oscar.
By the way, if you want to see a GOOD dramatization of the Titanic disaster, get A Night to Remember instead of this travesty."
And yet, the film still grossed a great deal of money. There is a sequel coming up, in which the ship doesn't sink, or something. Oh.
Despite Mr. Cameron's assertion regarding his kingship over Earth, this has not yet come to pass. Indeed, it is unlikely that he will ever ascend to monarchy, for a number of reasons:
1. It doesn't exist. The world is not ruled by one single person. The practical problems involved are too grandiose to list here.
2. People hate him too much.
The second one requires some measure of explanation. Cameron directed Titanic, the largest-grossing motion picture of all time. However, in the hangover that followed Titanic's success, people started realizing that the audience for the movie consisted almost exclusively of thirteen-year-old girls intent on seeing Leonardo DiCaprio. His charm wears off very quickly, and it is quite unlikely that Titanic will withstand the test of time.
Indeed, a great many moviegoers were dissatisfied even when Titanic was the talk of the town, so to speak. A T-shirt of the era contained the slogan, "It sank. Get over it." Dissatisfaction with the dialogue was one of the major criticisms; on www.imdb.com, the "memorable quotes" section for Titanic contained this bit of brilliant script:
Ruth: So this is the ship they say is unsinkable.
Cal: It is unsinkable. God himself couldn’t sink this ship.
In my further prerusal of the website, I found the following user comments:
"It is appalling that James Cameron hitched his disaster movie to the late-1990s fascination with the R.M.S. Titanic. He can now lump himself with other filmmakers such as Oliver Stone who distort history in an effort to make a film about something other than the historical event they end up teaching the American public about. But, even setting aside my disdain for his gross inaccuracies in Titanic history, and going with my deepest feelings that films are for enjoyment and escapism, this movie lacked the most important part of any film developing characters: I didn't care about Rose or Jack. Rose was spoiled. Jack was a foolish brat. This film also contained the fatal flaw in triangle love stories: I liked the bad guy. Billy Zane, beauty aside, was still the only character who probably was on the Titanic, and the only one I hoped made it off the ship alive. It is better to see the film that should have won the Oscar that year (LA CONFIDENTIAL) rather than waste anymore time even reading more comments about the movie that did win the Oscar."
"There is, in the Motion Picture Academy, a hidden criterion for awards. It's called the Miracle Factor. If a huge, overblown spectacle film production manages to make a killing at the box office and isn't as bad a everyone thought it would be, it acknowledges this miracle with its Best Picture award. This has happened at least twice: in 1952, the malign, Red-baiting Cecil B. De Mille, bullied the corrupt, Red-baiting Academy into presenting him with an Oscar for the ridiculous circus spectacle, Greatest Show on Earth; then, in 1997, an equally corrupt, politically correct Academy presented Titanic with its Oscar.
Titanic deserved an Oscar in only one category - special effects. The story was trite, the acting mediocre (except Leo's, which didn't even get nominated), the editing OK (maybe deserving of an Oscar, since great special effects demand great editing).
Titanic's "beating" out L.A. Confidential is akin to Greatest Show on Earth's "beating" out High Noon. Standing alone, Titanic is just another disaster spectacle. But placed beside a film like L.A. Confidential, Titanic becomes pure garbage.
This view is no better vindicated than by the Academy's choice for Best Picture the following year, Shakespeare in Love. If Titanic got the "Miracle it Wasn't That Bad" Oscar, then Shakespeare in Love was given the "Bad Conscience for Titanic" Oscar.
By the way, if you want to see a GOOD dramatization of the Titanic disaster, get A Night to Remember instead of this travesty."
And yet, the film still grossed a great deal of money. There is a sequel coming up, in which the ship doesn't sink, or something. Oh.
