MovieChat Forums > Titanic (1997) Discussion > Titanic vs A Night to Remember

Titanic vs A Night to Remember

posted 8 years ago by halfyank
18 replies | jump to latest

I’m sure this comparison has been done to death but I’ll throw my two cents worth in. I just finished watching both A Night to Remember and Titanic and want to post my thoughts. I’ve seen both movies many times. I thought Titanic was a great movie epic. Technically it had fantastic sets, special effects, costumes, all being wonderfully done. I really felt I got a chance to see what the Titanic was like. That’s not to say I really felt what it was like to experience what the people on the ship went through. One scene that stands out for me was when Rose and Jack were at the locked gate and had to retrieve the key. Something about the flashing lights in the background just said that this was a movie. I lost my “willing suspension of disbelief.” I didn’t feel their pain. This is not to take anything away from Titanic, its a incredible movie.

A Night to Remember however is just the opposite. Technically it’s pretty good for its time but it can’t compare to what is possible now. That said it conveys the emotions of what the people were going through far better. There were glimpses of emotion in Titanic, but to me they were kind of few and far between. Most of the time I can feel myself being wowed by the movie making of Titanic, but not so much by the story telling. ANTR has so many scenes I can think of that bring out my emotions. Offhand it’s hard to pick the best. I think one of the most emotional scenes in ANTR is where the old waiter finds and tries to comfort the lost little boy. That one chokes me up when I see it. I felt that man’s love for that little boy and his determination to make his last moments as calm as possible. Titanic has a somewhat similar scene with the Irish lady and her kids in bed, but it doesn’t affect me as much. Another example is the gentleman putting his wife and kids into the boat. Both movies have similar scenes but I FELT what he was going through, and what his wife was thinking, far more in ANTR than Titanic.

It just seems to me that Titanic is a great movie, while A Night to Remember is a great story.

[–] bsantosu (159) a year ago

Something to consider: ANTR was made only 46 years after the disaster. A lot of survivors were still around so there were more first-hand accounts to draw on. In 2024 terms, it would be like creating a disaster film about an event in 1982.

[–] JustinUK (50) a month ago

Nobody mentioning the entire scenes from ANTR replicated almost exactly in Titantic?

I just watched them back to back. I used to think Cameron is a very original writer/director but there is obvious plagiarism here in multiple places.

Edwards explaining the ‘mathematical certainty’, she’ll sink, the ice on deck football (soccer) scene, the ‘there’s another lifeboat for daddies over there’ scene.

I’m ignoring some other identical scenes which are probably more down to historical record “iceburg dead ahead”, when the lifeboats were tied together and questioning whether they would be swamped, but the cinematography is also identical and didn’t need to be.

It seems incredibly lazy of Cameron just to lift these scenes out words and all. I know he’s said he was a fan of ANTR. Sure he was, it must have saved him hours of writing time.

[–] Tam87 (1592) a month ago

That said it conveys the emotions of what the people were going through far better.

That's because James Cameron wrote his Titanic for teenage girls. Its script is trite & juvenile, with some gratuitous tits thrown in to please the guys.