The filming of this movie was a shit show from the very beginning. Almost everyone hated working on this. There was one scandal after another, and the filming conditions were very harsh. Everyone thought the final output would also be the same. Fox would threaten to shut down the production sen it was riddled with issues and Cameron kept on asking for more money. But every time Cameron show them the shot footage, they invested more into it. This has to be one of the most interesting filmmaking stories in history. Something only Cameron could have pulled off.

Immediately reminds me of the filming of The Abyss. There is an official documentary out on YouTube about that movie. Worth a watch.

Was also directed by James Cameron, so he had great experience with that matter.

It kinda was.

...Winslet, who played star-crossed lover Rose, suffered from hypothermia and the flu and sustained scores of injuries during six months of watery filming on a $20 million soundstage in Mexico.

“I chipped a small bone in my elbow,” Winslet said, before showing the interviewer some still-purple patches of skin. “And at one point I had deep bruises all over my arms..."

When filming the demanding sinking finale, the actress nearly drowned when Rose’s coat got caught on a gate in the water...

...dozens of people, including Cameron and Paxton, were served clam chowder that had been laced with the drug PCP (a k a angel dust) for lunch. Some of the hungry filmmakers downed three or four bowls of the stuff...

https://nypost.com/2023/02/09/titanic-movie-disasters-crew-poisoned-winslet-almost-drowned/

Amazing film and they way they captured it on what those people must have gone through I couldn’t imagine. It’s hard to acutely feel it even with the movie so good. There is a titanic museum in Gatlinburg, Tennessee that is astonishing. They have a room where it starts to flood and there are walls everywhere and that is when you fully feel what they went through and it is beyond scary feeing

If I recall correctly, Kate Winslet almost drowned filming this movie, it’s why everyone in Avatar had to do so much swimming training.

James Cameron is crazy. Look into how he filmed The Abyss. The underwater scenes were filmed in a 60ft high water tank and the whole crew had to wear scuba outfits and breathe oxygen tanks for 12 hour shoots. Plus they had to decompress before getting out of the tank. Everyone involved in that movie said they'd never do it again, it was the most horrific and grueling thing they'd ever done.

Look at the making of his other film The Abyss if you want to see real dangerous.

Fun fact- some of it was! Cameron pioneered CGI with some scenes of this film iirc.

The guy who plays John Jacob Astor (Eric Braeden), actually survived the sinking of the MV Wilhelm Gustloff: the single largest loss of life in any sinking. So he had some first hand experience of this.

(JJ Astor is the guy with the moustache who is climbing up the railing at the top of the staircase).

Kate Winslet (who played Rose) almost drowned and suffered from hypothermia

I got married to my first wife in 1998, before iPads and the ability to carry around your own entertainment while traveling. This was the movie they played on our cruise believe it or not. It was surreal watching this while at sea on a luxury cruise ship.

I remember before it's release many of the critics were saying it was going to be a $200 million dollar flop. I kind of thought the same thing, who is going to pay to see a movie about a boat sinking when we already know how it ends. Turns out we were all wrong, everybody wants to see a boat sink.

Great movie. Thanks to all the crew that died behind the scenes.

So unreal that the movie had a 9 month run at 1st run theaters compared to movies of today that average only 3 to 6 weeks.

Saw this in the movie theatre when I was like 7. I remember leaving heartbroken. And then I went and bought a tomegatche

He looks like he's about to kiss her on the cheek.

I wonder if they ever fucked whilst making this movie, thier sexual chemistry in this behind the scenes photo is off the charts!

Leo was 23 so I wouldn’t be surprised but he was basically the reason this movie was so successful. Other than being a great movie, Leo was what kept the gals keep coming back to the theaters.

Rose and jack look romantic til you scroll down and see her comedy feet sticking out

this is actually in front of the famous scene

FUN FACT:

It was due to Jack and Rose ignoring him, that Cameron decided to crash the ship.

https://i.redd.it/tjddsjlfj3d21.jpg

Came here to say this... saw it was already here... upvoted...

Titanic is actually a period piece horror movie wrapped in a romance

Yeah. I’m amazed that they were able to stop the Titanic sinking for a minute so the director could get a few words in. They should try that more often when boats are sinking.

Wait... are you saying they actually re-sank the Titanic wreckage for filming?! That's next-level dedication (or insanity) for movie realism. 😳

You should check out the prequel "Raise the Titanic"

Jeez, that's impressive. The whole set being on gimbals and cables to raise and lower it however Cameron wanted.

What gets me is all that nice furniture! Getting absolutely ruined. Would someone please tell me that it's just the cheapest of pressed board and was garbage before it was turned into those chairs!

>They just don’t make movies like this anymore.

There are no other movies Like this, so there can't be a "they used to make movies like this".

Titanic is first and last one that's did it on this scale and it has a legendary status because of it.

They must have had some way to drain all the water very quickly as well as ways to exit the set quickly while under water, and they also probably hired a lot of stunt actors who have lots of diving experience and had rescue personnel ready. James Cameron does not fuck around when it comes to being underwater.

I know nothing bout movie making, but I'd bet there's a ton of divers prepped under there, just out of sight, who have a responsibility each for an extra. And either once they're 'under' it cuts fairly quickly and they get them out, or they're handed a scuba regulator to breathe from, and 'held on to' by the diver til the water level is lowered. The extras themselves wouldn't be responsible for grabbing their own scuba gear, legally safety wise

Edit - also each extra will be a highly trained stunt person I'd imagine, for the more dangerous of scenes/water 'stunts'. I believe there were also life guards around, many safety folks who's job it was just to watch for actual drowning and send out a diver /immediately release all the water

The people in divers gear other than the cameramen are likely EMTs, and all the people in that scene should be stuntmen.

Cameron still does. Even with all the advancements in cgi and his heavy use of it in stuff like Avatar, he still plops people in to act underwater because it wouldn't look real enough otherwise.

Nolan's another one who loves his practical effects. Like that rotating hallway in Inception.

While that scene was a 1 shot take, there was other scenes like this scene filmed in the main dining hall while the Titanic was sinking where Jack and Rose would run through there and get into a fight with the butler which is why the butler later appears with a bloody head. They would set all the dining tables, plates, silverware, cups, chairs, furniture, etc and then sink it. Film a take then drain it, brush it, and reset everything.

In the end, most of the 4+ minute long dining room fight scene was cut from the final film. Which was the edited down version too.

Funny but based on the stories I’ve read about how he is as a director, it makes sense why he’s saying it, getting the confirmation that the actors/crew understand fully what he expects as a director. While he is tough, even dictatorial, he also seems like the kind of director that would appreciate it if you said back, “no, I don’t know what you mean. Please explain”

But how did they manage to do this safely? That’s so many people to keep track of, how did they make sure no one accidentally drowned?

I wonder how many of those actors peed in that water..

this is why advanced cgi ruined the magic of these productions

What's terrifying here?

Looks cool

I dated a guy once who worked in film and told me the absolute scariest part of it was the high voltage lighting cables. Knowing that and seeing all this water is making me very uncomfortable for everyone on set...

They had two scale models of the ship for the outside shots sitting in a bay next to a freeway in Long Beach, one model was 40' 1/20 scale of the entire ship and the other was 60' 1/8 scale of half the ship they could mechanically tilt up so that it looked like the missing half was submerged underwater.

They tilted it up and then "sunk" it repeatedly for filming. Each time it sunk, the horrified passers-by on the freeway would routinely call 911 to tell them a ship was sticking straight up out of the bay and was sinking.

The expenses were already astronomical ($210M, the most expensive movie ever made), and then post production of that movie took so much effort it almost brought down the movie studio. The Wall Street Journal regularly reported that the studio was pleading with James Cameron that it was running out of money, but Cameron knew he had a masterpiece that, if done perfectly, would be another Wizard of Oz and he just ignored them. The movie made over $1.4B in profit.

Miss the time when not everything was made with CGI…

Shew, two phobias. I wonder how much acting vs real panicking the actors were doing. Props to them not screaming "cut" every two seconds.

I don’t think we will ever get a film like this ever again.

Incredible, thanks for sharing :)

These are fantastic!

Saving this for when I eventually redecorate my apartment

Cameron lamented that the set had to be destroyed in the making of the film but he allowed a titanic interest group to bring a film crew in and document it all thoroughly

Seeing that first pic reminds me that we pretty much never see the port side of the ship in the movie. Every single time something happens on deck, it's always on the starboard side.

That must have been weird driving to work on the freeway and you see the Titanic sinking right there

Something about seeing a piece of a massive ship just below the surface always freaked me out. (Yes I know what submechanophobia is before a bunch of people point it out haha.)

It's a shame they demolished it, they should've kept it and turned it into a museum!

I’ve never seen the 2nd one in such clarity! Nice!!!