Titanic (1997)

Written and Directed by James Cameron
Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Billy Zane, Kathy Bates, Bill Paxton

My Advice: Don't Miss It.

To take the space to try to convey to you all of the things that Cameron did right with this film would basically wipe out my alloted server storage.  I could tell you about the incredible editing job that moves you from one time period to another with eerie seamlessness.  I could tell you about the cunning way Cameron introduces you to the tragedy and then makes you watch it unfold, step by step.  I could tell you about all the different things that the ship is going to be declared to represent in the next few weeks.  But I won't.  I'll tell you instead that it's brilliant.  It's the best Cameron I've seen.  The acting is superbly done.  DiCaprio and Winslet are two of  the most solid young actors we have around, and their relationship was so natural it was scary.  Even the normal places where the film might go wrong--the frame story, the fact you know the ending, the sheer schmaltz of trying to show humanity at its lowest and highest--it all works.  Do yourself a favor and see on the big screen in a theatre with a great sound system.  That about sums it up.