NewYork Magazine The most interesting news from the world
Without a doubt, the sensational news is the return to cinemas of Titanic 3D, one of the films defined by critics and amateurs, the colossal that conquered the world twenty-five years ago with its story, the visionary images of James Cameron and above all the soundtrack that made everyone dream, with the enthralling melody and the voice of Celine Dion with her My Heart will go on.
The month of February opens with the screening of a well-known and historic film and how many of us have not dreamed, have not been moved or have not mentally participated in duels and vital clashes, sitting on the seats of a cinema with eyes well fixed on the big screen.
Among the curiosities, many do not know that Celine Dion risked not being part of it, given that initially the director Cameron had asked the singer Enya, with her ethereal voice, to make the scenes of her Titanic “precious”, but the artist unexpectedly refused and the director asked the musician Trevor Horner to compose music for his film and to find an artist with Enya’s ethereal style, but Horner did his own thing and after composing My heart will go on, he did it secretly recording at Dion and everything that followed is legend today, the most beautiful and rousing legend of the last twenty-five years in the history of cinema.
Thus, on February 9th it will return to theaters after a quarter of a century, with the enchantment of Titanic 3D, one of the most watched films in the history of cinema, which narrates the dramatic events of one of the most serious naval disasters. Director James Cameron has renewed the masterpiece that made him the “king of the world”, giving it three dimensions, remastering the images of the stereoscopic version made in 2012 in 4K. But there are many curiosities surrounding this film. Already in 2005, a Collector’s Edition DVD was released inserting the 29 deleted scenes plus an alternate ending, bringing the film from 195 to 227 minutes. Furthermore, in 2012, the American director, attracted by the remarkable expressive potential of stereoscopy, printed a 3D version of the film, a meticulous process which led him to correct the position of the stars in a shot, because years earlier the astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, informed him that the position where the stars appeared on April 15, 1912, at the sinking site, was different.
At that point in December 2017, the film returned to 87 American theaters in the new version restored in HDR and today we too in Italy could enjoy the screening of this colossal, with a sharper remastering thanks to high frame rate technology. Beyond these technical details which will surely make a colossal of the last twenty years even more precious, it is natural for me to go back in memory and through it to retrace my personal memories of when a young teenager, as a cinema lover, I saw the trailer of this film in which the protagonist was one of the actors who had begun to make many girls’ heads “swirl” (in part including me, even if blonds are not my favourite), with that face of an almost good boy with the cunning eyes of someone who knew a lot, Leonardo Di Caprio, together with Kate Winslet, who without a doubt was and is my favorite actress, who I found and still find an artist full of charm, grace, charisma and acting quality at the above “puerile aesthetic judgements”.
I still remember the cinema in my town which screened him for a long time, also giving shows in the morning and I remember that the hall was always packed with spectators who, almost at risk of safety, many saw him standing, dreaming for three and a quarter hours, sigh, hope and finally cry, without feeling the tiredness of not sitting comfortably. As far as I’m concerned, I can’t say I’ve seen it a hundred times, like anyone who almost jumped through hoops to enter the Guinness Book, I saw it three times at the cinema and to see it I remember I had to book, seats were always scarce and in one of these three, I also took my mother, from whom I inherited the whole passion for art. There are many peculiarities that revolve around the Titanic 3D, for example few will know that the list of “no” that Cameron received for the roles of Jack and Rose is very long. For the role of Jack Dawson, the director did not immediately choose Di Caprio, but River Phoenix (actor who suddenly died of an overdose), then it was the turn of Christian Bale, Brad Pitt and even Tom Cruise. Even for the role of Rose, Winslet was chosen later, the first names were those of Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie.
Just as many are the records around this film and that few perhaps know, among these the fact that the study of James Cameron made of research and documentation lasted 5 years; the director himself dived into the waters where the wreck is located and spent more time on the remains of the ship than the passengers of the time did. Titanic was the first film to be released on both DVD and VHS when it was still in screening rooms; it was one of three films after Ben-Hur and the Lord of the Rings, the return of the King, to win 11 Academy Awards and finally was the first to win an statuette for a film that was written, produced, directed and edited by the same person, namely James Cameron. Therefore, at the conclusion of this excursus, brief, given the amount of curiosities that revolve around it, I dispassionately advise anyone who hasn’t seen it (it’s unthinkable to me, but I’m thinking of those who were born later) to also take advantage of this new projection technology and certainly more engaging, to go and see it, I think he will not regret it and perhaps he will be able to exclaim together with Leonardo Di Caprio: “I am the King of the World!”
