Its name stirs the imagination..Titanic. The unsinkable ship. The unimaginable catastrophe. The untold stories that lay in mystery two and a half miles beneath the waves of the North Atlantic. What buried tale of love, bravery, treasure and treachery, hidden by time and tragedy, waits here to be discovered? A beautiful socialite. A penniless artist. A priceless diamond. A romance so passionate that nothing on earth could stop it. A destiny so incredible that no one could have imagined it. A collision of lives that could only have happened on Titanic, the ship of dreams. The secrets are about to unfold...
It's sailing day, and White Star's dock swarms with activity. With most of the passengers already onboard, the pier is still choked with onlookers, luggage and last-minute provisions arriving in amounts that defy comprehension: two tons of Oxford marmalade; fifty tons of fresh fish, meat and poultry; twenty thousand bottles of beer and stout. The last batch of immagrants undergo heath inspections, scrutinized for lice and other maladies. Stepping from a gleaming white Renault, Caledon Hockley's wedding party arives just before sailing. Cal (Billy Zane) has taken advantage of last-minute arrangements to provide fiancee Rose DeWitt Bukater (Kate Winslet) and her mother Ruth, with the finest accomidations White Star Line has to offer-- the millionaire suite on B-deck, replete with its own private promenade deck. Cal is the richest man on the ship--atleast until J.J. Astor boards at Cherbourg-- and the expense of the gift is not lost on Rose anymore than it will be lost in the social elite who Cal strives to impress. "The challenge of the great ships was to provide an experience equavilent to one of Europe's first-class hotels," observes Zane. "It's incredible to think how these exquisite examples of art and architecture were compressed into metal balls and cast adrift on the ocean. Passengers weren't even supposted to realize they were at sea."
For all the exuberance around her, however, Rose seems almost bored. "I hope that when the audience meets Rose they'll actually think she's rather spoiled," shares Kate Winslet. "Then we'll come to know why she's so misterious around Cal, because boarding the ship is very much like she's walking into her execution, Really." Rose is drowning before the Titanic even sets sail, flailing against the restrictions of gender and class washing over her. "She's a very spirited girl, and she has alot to give," explains the young actress. "She wants to explore the whole world, but she knows that is never going to happen because she's engaged to Cal and is being pressured into his limited world of whats proper and whats acceptable. Initially, she probably did fall in love with him and was very flattered by his affection and attention. Nobody forced her into the engagement. It was only later that she realized he's rather a pompous piece of work." Her mother is not helping matters. Deep in debt after the death of her husband, Ruth is encouraging Rose to marry for money as means as saving them both. "The wedding being planned around her is like a death trap."
On a ship physically designed to prevent them from ever meeting, third class passenger Jack and first class passenger Rose have fallen in love. "I think the story is much more compelling because of the approaching disaster," says director James Cameron. "You witness these two people coming together in complete defiance of their world. They don't know in the space of a few days, everything they see around them will be gone."
