I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

S.O.S. Titanic (1979) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Decent telling of the April 14, 1912 tragedy with the main focus being on school teacher Lawrence Beesley (David Warner) and the fictional character Leigh Goodwin (Susan Saint James). Also included is David Janssen as John Jacob Astor, Cloris Leachman as Molly Brown, Ian Holm as J. Bruce Ismay, Helen Mirren as Mary Sloan and Harry Andrews as Captain Edward Smith. This film was originally shown over two nights on ABC with a running time of 150-minutes but the version I watched was the one released theatrically in Europe and running at 102-minutes. From what I've read the full version has never been released and all releases outside that original airing is the shorter cut. I have no idea if the longer version is better but I'm going to guess that the love story between Beesley and Goodwin was expanded. Their love story here is pretty hit and miss as it jumps all over the place and the conclusion also doesn't make too much sense. Those two characters get most of the screen time early on with the others getting bits and pieces here and there. The Molly Brown character is mainly used for comic relief but I found Leachman to be too over-the-top. I think Warner comes off the best here as he is very believable in the role and you just can't help but really like the guy. Holm is cold like a snake as Isley and Mirren does a pretty good job in her few scenes. I think the biggest problem is that none of the characters are written too well and many of them come off pretty one-dimensional. Perhaps this wouldn't be a problem in the longer version but none of them are overly entertaining here. I also wasn't too impressed with the direction, which seemed way too laid back for my blood. There's really no drama in any of the personal stories and even the sinking never reaches the type of drama that it should. With that said, the movie is still somewhat entertaining simply because of the subject matter. I really enjoyed the look of the picture and I found the sets to be extremely well done. I also found the sinking to be pretty good even though they do show the boat going down in one piece, which was thought to have been what happened at the time. The special effects are pretty good even though they never try to be too impressive and for the most part we see them from far shots. I've read mixed things about the extended version so perhaps it's a much better movie that fixes some of the problems I had with this version.

I have not seen the new 1997? version of the Titanic. Yes, I live somewhere deep in a cave under the ocean on a faraway planet. Anyway, I saw this one at the local library and thought, what the hey. (My daughter is enthralled with the Titanic, and she has seen the new one.... she lives on Earth, by the way! ;)) anyway, I thought we could watch it together. This movie is good for several reasons. Not blockbuster good, but good. There are very few, if any, 'special effects', which is something I find really cool. You get the effect of the ship actually sinking and all this water rushing around and everything without any 'digital' enhancement, to my knowledge.(Ex, today, the water very well be computer generated.) Special tiltings of the camera and general good acting made it seem real.(Although the guy that was falling in love with the girl--the older, blonde guy...not the young Irish guy, who was also in love, but with a totally different girl..) seemed a bit sleepy or dazed or something throughout the whole thing. When he is on the lifeboat and there are people floating in the water, he's like, "come on." barely putting his arm over the side of the boat, and he could have been smoking a pipe and in his pajamas for all anyone would know, not "Come on!!!COME ON!!!" All wild eyed and loud as I would picture myself to be in that situation, not to mention trying as hard as I could to get as many people in the boat with me as I could. I chalked it up to he was dazed, confused, scared, and possibly tired.I also found it refreshing that he and his 'girlfriend' meet and are talking earlier in the night, and they sort of 'break up' even though they weren't officially 'together', and I thought for sure they would be showcased in the lifeboat scene, "Ill save you, honey!!!" or whatever, but it didn't happen. I also thought one of them would die, but they're on the Carpathia(I love the sound of that name...have no idea what it means, it just sounds cool) "Well, that was scary, blah blah blah...) They totally leave you hanging! Are they going to go out again? Did they get married? After that, did they talk again? So, the movie makers didn't do two 'classic' movie moves in them saving each other or getting torn apart in death.Also, it was fairly historically accurate from what I have read about the music being played right up to the end. Personally, who the heck is going to be actually listening to music running around trying to survive??The ship going down was really cool the way they did it. It sounded eerie, too.We are rolling up on the 100th anniversary of the ship going down in a few years. It is a never ending reminder to me that man is not always as smart as he seems, we can never tame nature, anything can happen at any time, and that segregating people by class is stupid and wrong. High society and finery will get you nowhere on a sinking ship.

This film is an extremely atmospheric telling of the sinking of the Titanic. It used mainly real passengers to tell the story through, and as a result isn't too bad a production.However, the special effects were terrible and inaccurate. Firstly, the film makers used the Queen Mary to film on as the Titanic - this ship looks totally different and is the same ship used for the Poseidon Adventure. In the long shots of the ship sinking, SOS Titanic simply colourised scenes from A Night to Remember. The scenes of the ship sinking were really hopeless - continuity was terrible and the water actually flowed down the deck TOWARD the submerged bow. This is the most important part in a Titanic story, so to handle it so sloppily really is unforgivable.However, the scenes on board really captured the atmosphere of the times and the atmosphere of impending disaster to which all on board were fatally oblivious. The opening scenes as the Carpathia rescues survivors were really handled well (apart from Cpt. Rostron only organising the ship at the last minute - this wasn't true), and they conveyed a sense of numbed shock and loss. The characters are all real, which is a plus too.All in all, this film does not impress in realistic special effects, nor in making the disaster look real; but it does well in telling a story and telling it with considerable atmosphere.

As someone who has all the known videos mentioned by a previous reviewer and most of the leading books, not to mention biographies of Capt. Smith, 2nd Officer Lightoller and other assorted Titanic memorabilia, (I could go on);this positively is the worst film of the trajedy.The funnels were in Cunard's black/red (with black rings) colours, instead black top/buff; the superstructure of the bridge was rounded a la Queen Mary (where it was filmed), when it should have been squared off, the overall dimensions of the film set of the ship were tiny compared to the 886 foot reality.Most farcical was when "Capt. Smith" (Harry Andrews) is bellowing instructions through his megaphone to those getting into the boats - he only looks about 10ft from them!! The portrayals of JJ Astor, J Bruce Ismay and Molly Brown were appalling, totally unconvincing, under-researched and a travesty of the reality.When will film producers realise that when you film historical events, there is an army of highly clued-up amateur historians ready to pounce on you if you make a factual error!!I say lazy reearch.The only redeeming feature for me was to see David Warner playing Lawrence Beesley, the science master who had just resigned from Dulwich College and was taking his first trip abroad.One of my books is his "The Loss of the SS Titanic - Its Story & Lessons" (Mifflin 1912).Read this if you want a factual account from a second class male passenger's perspective.The bit where he tries to seduce an American school teacher sounds almost libellous, at the least, fictitous.Strangely David Warner is the only actor I can recall who has featured in two film productions of this event.The other of course being the dastardly man servant to Cal Hockley, in Cameron's fanciful production from 1997.Yes, I've got this video in my T collection but merely to have a copy of every available depiction.I do not find all the answers in any one but a bit of truth in all of them - admittedly not much in this one.Yes, I know this was made for TV and therefore had a limited budget for such a large canvas.One scene I liked was the Irish emigrants coming out by tender at what was then Queenstown, (now Cobh - I've been there) but why no depiction of Eugene Daly playing "Erin's Lament" on his Irish pipes?There is to my mind still many aspects of this drama still to be filmed.What about: 1.The near collision with the "New York" as T left Southampton?2.What about her construction at Harland & Wolff and delays in Sept. 1911 when workers had to leave off to repair S.S Olympic following her collision in Cowes, Isle of Wight with H.M.S. Hawke?3.What about the correct drama on "The Californian" especially with Ernest Gill, a donkeyman aboard, who saw rockets about the time T sent them up but reported nothing to her officers, (Read "The Ship That Stood Still"- by Leslie Read).Even "A Night to Remember"(1958) got it wrong - "Californian was NOT carrying passengers, merely cargo.Read my critique of this film in June 2002 for other errors in this, the best version yet for history fans, of the drama.4.Could we see more of Chief Officer Wilde someday?5.Could we see the reason these Olympic class ships were devisedand the meeting in 1907 in London attended by J.Bruce Ismay/Alexander Carlisle and other notables when this was discussed?.Film producers have a horrible temptation to dumb down leaving serious students with a feeling of frustration, but I suppose as usual it's all about putting bums on seats, students need to read all the leading works to ascertain the truth!!