I think I saw it on Saturday Night At the Movies on Channel 4 in New York City in 1962 - some fifty years after the disaster. I was only eight, and the name of the "Titanic" was not unknown to me, nor her fate. But I was watching the film, and followed much of the actions in it. But then came that conclusion...I was horrified by the last noisy moments of that purported model of R.M.S. Titanic as it plunged to the bottom.
It was not until I read Walter Lord's A NIGHT TO REMEMBER about two years later that I began to realize how that Oscar winning script was full of errors. Some of them (the passengers and crew singing "Nearer My God to Thee" is a good example) are moving, but did not happen. The fate that awaited most of those 1500 people still on board at 2:20 A.M. on April 15, 1912 was so apparent that to sing a mournful him regarding approaching death would have caused a really panicky across everyone (already with their nerves stretched too far). But I also read that the ship went down with no explosion, and no huge displacement of water. Actually it went down fairly quietly (since then we know it broke in half, but the passengers were all on the part that was the last to sink), and it went under with a mild gulp. In the film it goes down with a pair of roars, and displacing enough water to send a tidal wave or geyser into the sky (if it had happened in real life it would have flooded Newfoundland!).
Silly about that, but for me, for years, I was nervous looking at pictures of the Titanic going down (this has changed since Dr. Ballard found the actual wreck), and in a strange way it effected me - I actually had nightmares about the shipwreck, one triggered by the sound of crickets which my subconscious turned into the clanging of the warning bell on the ship.
In SLEEPING IN SEATTLE a scene involves Tom Hanks and his sister and brother-in-law talking about the effect of AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER in making the sister cry (and Hanks and his brother-in-law are equally affected by the film THE DIRTY DOZEN because of the accidental fate of Triny Lopez). But none talk about films that caused nightmares.
TITANIC (1953) has a lot going for it. The performance of Clifton Webb (from typical Webb social snob into cuckolded husband into strong father figure at the moment of crisis) was possibly his best dramatic performance in terms of one where his heart came out. Only parts of MR. SCOUTMASTER, THREE COINS IN A FOUNTAIN, and CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN are as critical or moving as this, and in them there are scenes that are far more funny than anything in this film. Here the screenplay enabled Webb's Richard Sturgis to show what he really had inside him. He was more than a man who could lead a cotillion or know what a first rate suit from Saville Row is like as opposed to a White Star liner evening suit.
Barbara Stanwyck is equally good - and at a disadvantage. Except for her two children, she is not able to rely on any male opposite Webb. Usually she could rely on one to be there to help pick the pieces at the end. Not here - she rediscovers the man she loved, but she has to reveal the greatest secret of her life and witness the greatest sea tragedy of her time. Quite a price to pay to see what she did have.
Brian Ahearn is fine as Captain Smith, who tries everything he can think of to buy more time for his passengers, and finds he can't. Richard Basehart is very good as the disillusioned priest who rediscovers his faith in time to comfort the doomed (including himself).
Another poster mentions Thelma Ritter's "Molly Brown" clone - a dandy performance, but the best is Ritter's quiet wisdom, as she suspects the friendly overtures of so-called manly Allan Joslyn. Her suspicions are paid off. Joslyn last moment in the film is a slight shocker, based on the story of one of the men who fled the ship, rather shamefully.
Not as factually correct as A NIGHT TO REMEMBER or TITANIC (1997), but more tolerable (except for that...brr...conclusion) than the Nazi TITANIC (1943). But moving and sturdy in it's own way.
It was not until I read Walter Lord's A NIGHT TO REMEMBER about two years later that I began to realize how that Oscar winning script was full of errors. Some of them (the passengers and crew singing "Nearer My God to Thee" is a good example) are moving, but did not happen. The fate that awaited most of those 1500 people still on board at 2:20 A.M. on April 15, 1912 was so apparent that to sing a mournful him regarding approaching death would have caused a really panicky across everyone (already with their nerves stretched too far). But I also read that the ship went down with no explosion, and no huge displacement of water. Actually it went down fairly quietly (since then we know it broke in half, but the passengers were all on the part that was the last to sink), and it went under with a mild gulp. In the film it goes down with a pair of roars, and displacing enough water to send a tidal wave or geyser into the sky (if it had happened in real life it would have flooded Newfoundland!).
Silly about that, but for me, for years, I was nervous looking at pictures of the Titanic going down (this has changed since Dr. Ballard found the actual wreck), and in a strange way it effected me - I actually had nightmares about the shipwreck, one triggered by the sound of crickets which my subconscious turned into the clanging of the warning bell on the ship.
In SLEEPING IN SEATTLE a scene involves Tom Hanks and his sister and brother-in-law talking about the effect of AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER in making the sister cry (and Hanks and his brother-in-law are equally affected by the film THE DIRTY DOZEN because of the accidental fate of Triny Lopez). But none talk about films that caused nightmares.
TITANIC (1953) has a lot going for it. The performance of Clifton Webb (from typical Webb social snob into cuckolded husband into strong father figure at the moment of crisis) was possibly his best dramatic performance in terms of one where his heart came out. Only parts of MR. SCOUTMASTER, THREE COINS IN A FOUNTAIN, and CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN are as critical or moving as this, and in them there are scenes that are far more funny than anything in this film. Here the screenplay enabled Webb's Richard Sturgis to show what he really had inside him. He was more than a man who could lead a cotillion or know what a first rate suit from Saville Row is like as opposed to a White Star liner evening suit.
Barbara Stanwyck is equally good - and at a disadvantage. Except for her two children, she is not able to rely on any male opposite Webb. Usually she could rely on one to be there to help pick the pieces at the end. Not here - she rediscovers the man she loved, but she has to reveal the greatest secret of her life and witness the greatest sea tragedy of her time. Quite a price to pay to see what she did have.
Brian Ahearn is fine as Captain Smith, who tries everything he can think of to buy more time for his passengers, and finds he can't. Richard Basehart is very good as the disillusioned priest who rediscovers his faith in time to comfort the doomed (including himself).
Another poster mentions Thelma Ritter's "Molly Brown" clone - a dandy performance, but the best is Ritter's quiet wisdom, as she suspects the friendly overtures of so-called manly Allan Joslyn. Her suspicions are paid off. Joslyn last moment in the film is a slight shocker, based on the story of one of the men who fled the ship, rather shamefully.
Not as factually correct as A NIGHT TO REMEMBER or TITANIC (1997), but more tolerable (except for that...brr...conclusion) than the Nazi TITANIC (1943). But moving and sturdy in it's own way.