Titanic Is a Movie Record Breaker. But How True to History Is It?
HOST:
Welcome to AMERICAN MOSAIC in VOA Special English.
(MUSIC)
I'm Doug Johnson.
This week on our show:
We answer a question about the movie "Titanic" ... HOST:
Our listener question this week comes from Burma.
Tharr Naing wants to know about the historical truth in the movie “Titanic”.
The nineteen ninety-seven movie “Titanic” is a record breaker in several ways. Ten years ago, it was the most costly movie ever made. "Titanic" has earned more money than any other movie in history. And, it received eleven Academy Awards.
The film tells the tragic story of the huge British passenger ship that sank in nineteen twelve. The Titanic was built to be a fine example of modern technology. It was the largest ship ever made. It was considered unsinkable. It was sailing on its very first trip from England to New York with many rich and famous people on board. The Titanic hit a huge piece of ice near Newfoundland, Canada. The ship sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.
More than one thousand five hundred of its two thousand two hundred passengers died. Many movies, books, and plays have been produced about the disaster.
The movie "Titanic" is loosely based on historical facts. The director James Cameron worked hard with the movie crew to recreate historically correct clothing and rooms. Experts helped recreate the ship and the action of its sinking in as truthful a way as possible.
The images of the shipwrecked Titanic at the bottom of the ocean are real. And several of the people in the movie were real people, such as the boat's captain and Molly Brown, who survived the disaster. She later became known as the “Unsinkable” Molly Brown. It is also true that the watchman did not see the large iceberg in time to save the ship. And it is true that there were not enough lifeboats on the ship to save all of passengers.
What most people like best about the movie is its love story. But the two lovers, Rose and Jack, were not real people. There was also no diamond called the Heart of the Ocean.
However, another small love story in "Titanic" is based on fact. The movie shows an older man and woman who chose to die together instead of being separated. Isador and Ida Straus were offered a place on a lifeboat. Isador would not get in the boat as long as there were women on the Titanic who could be saved. So, Ida refused to leave her husband. Witnesses remember hearing her say to her husband, “Where you go, I go." The two were last seen sitting side by side on a chair on the ship holding hands.
