Reviews

I've always considered David Fincher to be one of the greatest directors of all time (though 'Zodiac' was a mind-numbing, energy-draining train wreck, and 'Fight Club' is one of the most pathetic excuses for brute-masculinity-worshiping, apocalypse-craving, self-righteous, pseudo-philosophical, sexist-in-both-directions garbage I've ever seen, and possibly the most overrated film of all time, though there are certainly a few other contenders for that title). Still, Fincher was also responsible for 'Se7en', which is, by my index, one of the most powerful, engrossing, genre-defining films of the last few decades, not to mention his relatively recent direction of the brilliant 'The Social Network', his previous stewardship of 'The Game', and his laudable work on 'House of Cards'. So I was relatively certain, especially given its largely stellar reviews and a personal recommendation from one of my best friends, that after I went to see 'Gone Girl' this evening, I would have, at the very least, moderately enjoyed it, if not referring to it as a "modern masterpiece". In the end, what I enjoyed most about it was the pervasive running criticism in my head.

I am locked in the throes of the biting emotional disappointment and vitriol this film just inspired in me, so my feelings are probably influencing me to go overboard with this particular slaughter, but I'm going to say this anyway: THIS IS ONE OF THE WORST FILMS I'VE EVER SEEN (and no, I'm quite sure that that is not an exaggeration)! It's not quite in my bottom 10 or 20, nor will it be, but it lives merely inches above them on my list (in Size-10 font), still swirling the soil at the bottom of the toilet bowl. It is an insult to whatever audiences it victimizes. It is, to borrow a word from one of my intellectual heroes, Daniel Dennett, a cavalcade of "deepities", as if a bad soap opera graduated to the big screen and suddenly got a little better at passing itself off as important and hoodwinking its viewers into swallowing its not-so-well-veiled insults at modern culture, marriage, men, women, logic, and law enforcement. Don't get me wrong: these are all things which are imperfect, and which often have aspects which beg for condemnation, but said condemnation for its own sake, or for the sake of uniqueness or political correctness or rebellion or ostentation, and built on a quagmire of its own obvious narcissism, doesn't convince, but rather sickens. And for all the moments it could have had in its Brobdingnagian duration, it found no honesty in any of them. SPOILERS AHEAD (though they might not all be well-understood by those who haven't seen the film)

1. First of all, nobody in their right mind would believe Rosamund Pike's character after she "comes back from being kidnapped and raped" and gushes about her "loving and misunderstood husband", a story that most everyone in the general public (and the FBI, in one of the film's countless absurdities) seems to fall for, 'Gone Girl' equating the American general public and the FBI with Charlie Brown, and Pike with Lucy.

2. I really do wonder if Ben Affleck has ever had a single truly honest moment in front of a camera, whether in interviews as himself (one quite recently with Sam Harris and Bill Maher, among others), or in his ridiculous movies playing wooden characters ('Daredevil', 'Jersey Girl', 'Gigli', 'Pearl Harbor', 'The Town', and now 'Gone Girl', to name a few). He is somnolent and one-dimensional, with rarely a hint of color.

3. I know a film is bad when my absolute favorite thing about it, not to mention the most convincing thing, is a character played by Tyler Perry. What a joke.

4. This film tries to convince us that all or most men are lascivious, shallow sex-pigs who only care about women into whom they have a chance of inserting their penises, and into whom they wish to do so, and that all or most women are manipulative, vindictive, masterfully-controlling, mind-reading femme-fatale-potentials, who are always putting on a face for everyone, who are so complex and misunderstood and deep and brilliant, and who only want husbands who are completely spineless and too afraid to stand up to them, and whose love of anyone but themselves is not but a well-crafted charade. Such notions are not only adolescent stereotypes (and pathetically tired and pedestrian, even for that age group), but bear little, if any, relationship to reality. Reality is far more nuanced, more interesting, and more pleasurable, with many more twists and turns. And both men and women are aggregates that consist of mostly very good people, despite many examples to the contrary. Norman Bates really isn't that common in real life.

5. Neil Patrick Harris' character (the worst-cast character in the whole story) made no sense. It is not believable that he would side with Pike after everything she put him through before, when she set him up similarly to the way she set Affleck up, and it is not believable that he would keep in contact with her or let her into his house. The film is just littered with increasingly-laughable implausibilities.

6. The scene where Affleck and Pike meet is one of the worst-written scenes of dialogue or human interaction I've ever witnessed, far more absurd than anything from 'Titanic' or 'Dawson's Creek' or 'Twilight', and far more nausea-inducing. I expected so much more from David Fincher, though I guess the dialogue is Gillian Flynn's fault. Still, he should've fixed it.

To conclude, I beg of everyone who reads this: please don't contribute money to this film! Seriously, you could inevitably be doing something far more valuable with both your time and said money, and films like this should stop being made.

As an artist and a human being, I am truly appalled at this travesty. I mean, this is it! This is the movie that has finally inspired me to create a Bottom 100 Movies of All Time list! It was so offensive to me that I literally feel like I've lost a piece of my humanity. I mean, where do I start? It was one contrived circumstance after another. It was a hodgepodge of blandly-written caricatures thrust into ridiculous situations that were hopelessly underdeveloped, unexplained, and cartoonish (both the caricatures and the situations). It was one pointless Hollywood action sequence after another. It was a hurricane of inconsistencies and pseudo-profundities. And it was all built on a story that should've taken five minutes to finish. Literally, I could've made a five-minute short film with this exact plot, and achieved something far more compelling than this trash, without the aid of hundreds of millions of dollars and A-list filmmakers.

Let's start with the story: Bilbo Baggins goes back in time (60 years, to be exact) and recounts to Frodo the "harrowing" (more like mind- numbing) events of his first adventure with Gandalf. When he's back in time, and Gandalf comes to his door offering an adventure like nothing he's ever experienced before, he impolitely brushes him off. Later, after Gandalf has brusquely shown up at his door with a bunch of random, uncouth dwarfs and used them to invade his privacy and his home and pillage his food supplies and other belongings, he decides, "Oh, hey, maybe I really should go with them. I mean, after all, my life is a boring, pointless scrapbook of saccharine seconds, and I have nothing better to do or think about in the near future than my brainless, useless self, so...why not?" Then, they go on the adventure, which consists of one random, meaningless encounter after another and a series of strange, unjustified action sequences that never once manage to keep me in suspense. Then, the movie starts putting its caricatures into jeopardy over and over again with derivative, stereotypical fantasy creatures that very easily should've killed them every time. Of course, the writers didn't want their caricatures to have to deal with loss or their audience to have to deal with depth and uncertainty, so they just decided to save their caricatures' lives in some laughably implausible way every time they put them in danger. (I mean, that scene near the end where all the caricatures are at the bottom of that slope, by the edge of the cliff, and all the trees they were standing on have been ripped from the ground by the pack of vicious wolf-beings and knocked over, subsequently forcing them all to jump onto the last tree at the very edge of the cliff to keep away from the wolf-beings. Then, as the tree continues to fall over from the weight of all these caricatures and the wolves continue to advance on them, Gandalf suddenly remembers that he has magical powers which include a staff that can apparently light pine cones on fire. So, he starts grabbing pine cones, lighting them on fire, handing them out to the dwarfs like cupcakes, and throwing them down at the wolves, which of course conveniently starts just enough of a fire to drive the wolves back and separate them from the helpless dwarfs, while not starting enough of a fire to just kill everyone. Then, later on in the scene, after one of the most ridiculous revenge-hero ego-trip battles in film history, the tree continues to "almost fall off the edge of the cliff and kill everybody". Wow, such originality! Then, just before they die, a bunch of huge birds that Gandalf apparently called with whispers to a butterfly swoop in and save them.) Okay, who cares? Anyone? Show of hands? I'm hoping none of you are dumb enough to fall for this blatant, pathetic excuse for a money-grab by Peter Jackson and the rest of his merry band of Hollywood thugs. Seriously, if you are, seek help. Fast. Or end up getting caught by those creepy men with butterfly nets who've been chasing you, and spend the rest of your life in white pajamas. Your choice. The point is, this movie had no story. It had no character development. It had no life. And anyone convinced otherwise is just plain idiotic.

Now, for the cinematography. It was magnificent! The idea of filming it in 48 frames per second was a stroke of genius by Peter Jackson. But my praise ends there, as it should.

As for the music, it was copy-and-paste "composition". AND IT WAS ALREADY MEDIOCRE THE FIRST THREE TIMES AROUND, WHEN HE USED IT FOR THE LOTR TRILOGY! There's nothing new here. Some of the instrumentation is slightly different. One of the themes is expanded upon a little. But that's it.

And now, for the ending: OH DEAR GOD (that I don't believe in): Why (if you do exist) do you have to let your creatures be this stupid? Please, can you explain it to everyone, 'cause we're all waiting? This movie's ending is an insult to the nonexistent intelligence of the general American public! It's not even an ending! All it is is a set-up for a sequel, meant to do absolutely nothing but entice the witless, inane, unsuspecting popcorn glutton to shell out another fifteen or so bucks for a ticket, another twenty or so for concessions, and yet another fifteen or so for an unwitting friend, date or family member to tag along. They literally just stand there, look out at the horizon, and identify the far-off mountain as the dwarfs' home that everyone's supposedly fighting for (in the worst pretend story-line EVER). And what do we learn is the point of that two hours and forty-five minutes? Absolutely nothing!

Nice try, Hollywood! Not all of us are as dumb as you'd love us to be.

First of all, this film removes even more from the book than any of the others did from their books. While, as others have said, it is impossible to include EVERYTHING from a book so long into a movie so short, there is something to be said for the presence of loyalty in a big-screen fantasy story adaptation. It's only positive aspects were the performances for Ron Weasley's and Slughorn's characters.

Detractors:

Detractor Number One: The film focuses on love stories that are mostly footnotes in the book, and it doesn't even get the details of those stories right. How pathetic is that? The love arc between Harry and Ginny doesn't even exist in this, and that was one of my favorite parts of the series! It is altered into an awkward, laughable teenage disaster. First of all, Harry wasn't in love with her or even attracted to her for the whole book. He fell in love with her in the middle after realizing his jealousy over her relationship with Dean Thomas. He also spent quite a lot of time struggling with the possible ramifications of his feelings toward her, especially where his friend and Ginny's brother Ron is concerned. In this film, he shows interest in her from the beginning, completely derailing the rhythm of their story. He also doesn't seem to care at all about how this might jeopardize his friendship with Ron. This elevates his character's narcissism and undercuts his likability, making him come off as an inconsiderate snob. There are also moments between him and Ginny (and, occasionally, between them and Ron) that didn't even exist in the book, and those seem nothing but a waste of time. There are also key points from the book that Layabout Yates was too lazy to include, like the moment when Harry tells Ginny that he will have to leave her for the next year to fight Voldemort. Oh, and I forgot to mention that Ginny's relationship with Dean ISN'T EVEN SHOWN, NOT ONCE. They never show or even hint at Ginny and Dean's breakup, which not only makes her kiss with Harry seem underhanded, but it just comes off as utterly despicable storytelling. Furthermore, to move on to the other love story, Ron and Lavender dominate the movie! I'm fairly certain they show EVERY scene depicted in the book between the two of them, never showing the same consideration and attention to detail when dealing with ANY OTHER PLOT POINT IN THE BOOK, including the most important element, Tom Riddle's past. They must spend more than an hour detailing every curve down the winding and distracting path of this inconsequential arc. While that does add to the comedy of a few scenes, it mostly just steals focus from more important details. And, as is true with every Harry Potter story, "The magic is in the details."

Detractor Number Two: Bill and Fleur, along with any mention of their relationship and engagement, are left out of the story entirely.

Detractor Number Three: Dumbledore is, once again, portrayed without an ounce of grace or poise by the actor who took over for Richard Harris.

Detractor Number Four: This is, perhaps, the biggest problem I have with the movie: THE BATTLE IN THE ENDING WAS OMITTED! What was Yates smoking when he had the mental breakdown that led to that decision? Does he realize that the movie would've attracted A LOT more viewers with that scene included? Not only that, but that particular sequence is vital to explaining parts of the next book (which Yates has proved conclusively that he's not talented enough to do justice to).

Detractor Number Five: Voldemort doesn't even appear in the entire film, NOT ONCE! Now that I think about it, I take back what I said about Detractor Number Four (the absence of the final battle): THIS IS THE MOST REVOLTING MISTAKE OF THIS FILM! How is it possible to have a film based on the book 'The Half-Blood Prince' without even having Voldemort appear once? Wow, David Yates has outdone his own stupidity! I didn't think he could possible screw up this film as much as he did the fifth one, and I was right: he screwed it up even more!

Detractor Number Six: Dumbledore is shown to be able to apparate in and out of the castle, as is Harry. In the books, neither can happen, as nobody is able to apparate within the grounds of Hogwarts. Not only that, but the only explanation for this is Dumbledore's completely unrelated words, "Being me does have its privileges." Give me a freaking break! Madame Rosmerta's role wasn't even touched upon. It seems there is no detail too large or too small for Layabout Yates to mishandle.

Detractor Number Seven: Alan Rickman's portrayal of Snape in this film does what it never has before: it becomes lame. He actually looks bored every time he's on screen, including the uncharacteristic "Shh" he gives Harry while Harry hides below like a coward and Snape goes upstairs in the Astronomy Tower and kills Dumbledore. Snape even looks bored killing Dumbledore!

Detractor Number Eight: There is almost no magic whatsoever. It's as if Hogwarts is merely a set for the characters to flirt in. It seems like the whole school year, at least in the movie, was a waste of time for everyone.

Detractor Number Nine: Oh, screw it with the rest of the detractors! I've mentioned enough for you to get the idea. This movie disgraces not only the entire Harry Potter franchise, but Hollywood, Warner Brothers, and everyone else involved! How could a literary genius like J.K. Rowling, possibly the smartest and most detail-oriented fantasy writer alive, allow any company, no matter how much money was involved, to hack up any one of her works of art like this? I'm completely appalled!

Let me start by saying this: 'Public Enemies' is exactly what a gangster flick should be. It is genuine, heartfelt realism at its finest with a pulse that never lets up and never ceases to strangle the viewer. Not once in my entire life has a movie captured my imagination and my heart with every single solitary frame. It is the only movie ever made that succeeds in creating fully realized, well-rounded, graphically fleshed-out characters without ever touching upon a single hint of back story (aside from a quick second of dialogue from the 'Maestro of Robbery' himself that reads something like this: "I grew up on a farm. My mother died and my father beat me because he knew no other way to raise me."). Never has a book been able to accomplish this feat. Never has any story I've encountered (and that's quite a grandiose collection of stories, given that I'm a writer myself) been able to reach the heights of this brilliance. The sheer magnitude of the experience has left me dumbstruck.

The film begins and ends centered around John Dillinger. Every other character, aside from Billie, Dillinger's "Blackbird", is just a sideshow for the main attraction. Christian Bale's Melvin Purvis fades into nothingness cloaked in the failure to capture his prey, the failure to appease his guilt...and the failure to entertain the audience. But that doesn't matter. Because each of Purvis' moments on screen belong to Dillinger, and Dillinger alone. Purvis, like all the rest of us, is just a passenger along for the ride of his life. Never is he able to escape, even (I suspect) after one of his agents kills Dillinger near the end of the film. Billie shares the same fate. While she sits in her cell after Dillinger's death, the agent who shot him enters and sits with her, at Dillinger's request (his last). He gives her a message straight from his last stage (the stage of his demise, outside the theatre in his favorite town to hold up): "Bye bye, Blackbird." And the film cuts to black, leaving us with our hearts in our throats and our fingers clutched on the armrests. And so ends the masterpiece unlike any other, far too soon as it is unfortunately unable to last forever.

First, let me say that I wanted to give this experience a 0 out of 10, but that wasn't offered! I went to see 'Twilight' after reading the incredible book series all at once because they were so addictive! Those books were magical; they transported me into a world of storytelling platinum! They were so detailed, so character driven, so developed...and yet so easy to read at the same time! They were quite an accomplishment! Then, the movie opened up in my hometown of Anchorage, Alaska, and I went to see it with a group of friends, hoping I would at least enjoy myself! All of my friends had a good time, and actually liked the film! I was the only one in the entire group who saw it for what it really was: lazy, atrociously written, rushed, emotionally vacant drivel! I have literally seen some porn that was more intelligently written and put together than this movie and its script were! I am utterly appalled! The book laid it all out there, neatly, skillfully and carefully. All the screenwriters had to do was translate it to film without botching it all up! All they had to do was follow the story, without ditching key details and without misrepresenting the emotion of every single character! They just couldn't find the skills in their pea-sized brains to pull that off, despite how much they must have been paid! I find that absolutely pathetic! Let's get into some of the key details that were destroyed; they weren't just lost in translation, they were DESTROYED! First of all, Edward Cullen, played without any humanity, emotion, or personality by Robert Pattinson, who should have been a model instead of an actor, was turned into some sort of boyish twit of a vampire instead of the fascinating, brooding, fully-developed, intelligent, and sensible character he was in the books. His romance with Catherine Hardwicke's vapid, mindless, whiny, incessant version of the heroine in the story was entirely laughable! Still, he was incredibly beautiful to look at, so at least they got that part of the book right! Secondly, the members of his family had no discernible identity separate from him at all in the film; they might as well have just been left out entirely! If I hadn't read the book before seeing this trash, I wouldn't even have known who the hell they were! They were faceless and brainless! I couldn't have even forced myself to care one bit if every single one of them had been slaughtered; that's usually not a good sign in a movie! Thirdly, there were so many key emotional buildups that were ignored! There was the development of the love triangle between Mike, Bella (the main heroine), and Edward, which was made into more of a soap opera than a valid, honest, heartfelt interpretation. There was no development there of any kind; they just jumped right through it, as they did with every other buildup in the film. There was absolutely no explanation of Bella's relationship with her dad; his character just faded into the woodwork like so much lost potential in this movie! They turned the scene where Bella and Edward are in the woods together, and Edward is telling her that he is a vampire for the first time and jumping around like a frog, into a hilariously awful massacre of its events! Pattinson, or Edward, spends the scene trying to act with emotion, and instead acting with constipation! Kristen Stewart, or Bella, spends the scene attempting to display shock and awe, and instead showcasing her uncanny ability to stare into space while pretending to pay attention to the man, or vampire, she's supposedly in love with! What a sham! There are just too many negative comments one could make regarding this movie and its performances and its direction, so I'm just going to leave it at that! This goes out to the general public: for the sake of your lives and your time being cherished, do not go to this movie! There is not enough money or treasure in the world that could make this desolate experience worthwhile!

With everybody going completely nuts over this film and giving it practically nothing but rave reviews, I was sure I was going to be disappointed, especially after looking forward to it for so long. Instead, I was more impressed than I ever expected to be. This film is an absolute triumph!!! First, let me start by discussing its performances. The two most important characters are Batman and The Joker, with Harvey Dent/Two Face coming up close behind. Christian Bale gives us a haunted, visionary, and intensely driven effectuation of his Batman. Bruce Wayne is a playboy extraordinaire with an unlimited budget, flaunting his face all over the place as a master of business and a lover of good parties, but not exuding much substance. He hides his substance underneath, unleashing it with his Caped Crusader when he can hide his identity sufficiently from the world (meaning "at night"). He effectively comes close to eliminating crime from the streets, until a brilliantly psychotic criminal mastermind known only as The Joker sweeps into town and arouses the criminal underworld, shaking it up to its core and inciting massive tidal waves of chaos that spread through Gotham faster than wild fire. As Batman sinks deeper within himself, losing sight of Bruce Wayne entirely, Christian Bale grows darker and more pessimistic and morose than ever before in his performance. You can see his every emotion in his face as he gradually loses hope that he will ever be able to stop a monster like this Joker character. There is one scene in particular when it becomes clear that he may not even understand the man he is trying to eliminate. When he is in his computer/gadgetry room with his butler, he talks about Batman having no limits and tries to show understanding of his villainous opposite. But when he starts talking about The Joker as if he's just another stone of coal in the fire, his butler corrects him by saying that even he perhaps doesn't quite understand his nemesis. Alfred, the butler, explains that The Joker is a man without principle, without logic, who cannot be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with, and who just wants to "watch the world burn." This is, of course, so true of The Joker, more so than with anyone else Batman has ever faced. Heath Ledger, giving an astonishingly deviated, psychopathic, frenetic, and downright terrifying turn as The Joker, satisfies us all, creating the best villain the world has ever seen in a movie! He is not so much a human being as he is a catastrophic force of terror and mayhem. Ledger's performance delivers brilliant lines like, "Kill you! (Laughs) I don't wanna kill you! You...complete me!" and, "Why don't we cut you up into little pieces and feed you to your pooches! Then we'll see how loyal a hungry dog really is!!!" and, "You and me (to Batman), we could do this forever." I think Ledger's Joker thrives on his remarkable metaphorical attachment to Batman's hip, while Batman's sanity is nearly crushed by the relationship. Of course, The Joker doesn't just do this to Batman. After murdering Rachel Dawes (a job well done in my opinion), he succeeds at turning Harvey Dent, the White Knight of the city, a loyal, honorable, and well-beloved public figure, into a crazed lunatic, delivering to Chance (the entity) the power over life and death with a coin toss. Aaron Eckhart delivers powerfully as Two Face, whose morals can't quite be destroyed by his multiple personality disorder. The way that he descends into the devastating role is sensational! That is what happens with all three of the main actors; they disappear, and all we're left with is a trio of idealists (yes, that includes The Joker) whose ideals are always clashing at each other. This makes for the most brilliant film I've ever had the pleasure of experiencing.

As for the other, smaller performances, they are all exactly what they need to be. Gary Oldman is more impressive than last time as Lieutenant Gordon; Maggie Gyllenhaal lifts the bar with her DA Rachel Dawes (though, not by much); and Nestor Carbonell is just what he needs to be.

The other aspects of the movie, the action, the philosophy (especially from The Joker), the climax, and the clash is all phenomenal! It sets new standards for these kinds of films (comic book, action, drama). Also notable is the brilliant use of IMAX cameras for a lot of the imagery. This makes for a wider canvas and increases the reality of the adventure. This film is, in every respect, a masterpiece of the highest order! Well done to everyone involved!!! You all deserve medals!

What an amazing motion picture this is! It has the will to go far enough with the story to ensnare the senses of the viewer and engulf them up to their necks until they're swimming in the proverbial ocean of the fantasy. Yet it also makes the fantasy entirely believable, so much so that we could actually see it happening in our reality. Not only does it achieve this feat, it teaches valuable lessons about life. It teaches us patience and hard work. It teaches us to act when things need to be done. It teaches us to live with initiative and drive, and to fight against evil and injustice. It does this through its talented performances and clever narrative.

First, there is Bale's performance as the winged crusader. What a thrill it is to watch him in action! He presents a one-of-a-kind performance with a great respect toward his character. With scenes like the ones in the long montage of his transformation from person to "god" and the ending, when he uses Lieutenant Gordon to destroy the train tracks above the city with Liam's villain in the front car and jumps out of the car at the last minute, this film has the ability to capture even those viewers with the shortest of attention spans.

Secondly, there are the other performances, Katie Holmes aside, that are also well-developed and convincing. Most of them really do not require too much effort, acting wise, but they are exactly what they should be, and are not overdone. Holmes' performance is the only lacking contribution to the film, and is not enough to ruin it by a long shot. 'Batman Begins' is a masterpiece of action, drama, intrigue, mystery, gadgetry, purpose, suspense, and darkness. It will be hard to beat it, but hopefully, 'The Dark Knight' will succeed in doing so. I give this action epic 10/10!

Titanic, what has been called by some "the best movie of all time" and by others "the worst movie of all time," is absolutely incredible! Not only is it a movie; it is an experience! Let me say, to begin, that I am a teenage boy, and practically every one of my friends laughs and scoffs at this movie, especially when they learn that I like it! I just can't believe my ears whenever I hear them say things like "I've never been so bored in a movie in my life!" or "Dude, that ain't cool!" or "You can't like that movie!" or "What a disgrace to history!" or "I want my three hours back, along with my sanity!" Each one of these quotes is direct and an accurate depiction of their feelings toward this magnificent work of art. There are so many things to be remarked upon in this film! First, let me say, that Leonardo DiCaprio is even more beautiful than Kate Winslet, which is definitely saying something! I completely understand and sympathize with all of the teenage girls who used to kiss their TV screens whenever he would appear. You ladies have wonderful taste! Furthermore, his performance was exactly what it should've been. It was dramatic when needed, subtle when required, sarcastic and glib when appropriate... There was absolutely nothing wrong with his portrayal of Jack Dawson. There were so many charming moments, like when Jack is teaching Rose how to spit, and he gets ready to spit a giant spit ball, and Rose's mother and mother's friends suddenly appear out of nowhere, or when he starts drawing his glowing portrait of the angel that is Rose DeWitt Bukater, and the beautiful, wordless piano lyric sweeps the viewer off their feet. It's the moments like that, so well-thought-out and well-put-together, that make this film stand among the greatest of all time.

The next thing to remark upon is Kate Winslet's performance, which was even better than Leo's! She captured the melancholic poetry, romanticism, intelligence, poise, lyricism, and beauty of her character Rose. The moments just before Rose meets Jack, when she's running to the back of the ship to commit suicide after having escaped dinner with her perilously wealthy, sycophantic, judgmental, hypocritical crowd, are thrilling and devastating. They represent the worst of the darkness in her character, and I happen to find them fascinating. In contrast, nearly every moment she experiences with Jack before the ship crashes, is romantic and real. Sure, their story is not historically accurate. It isn't supposed to be. The movie is meant to be a work of historical "fiction!" With historical fiction, there will inevitably be facts that have been twisted around to fit the more dramatic and recent interpretations. That goes with the definition of the genre.

Lastly, the music in the movie is by the illustrious and unparalleled composer James Horner (my personal favorite.) Titanic is his best score to date, and I have every single one! Titanic's score is an explosion of diversity, lyricism, simplicity and complexity. It unites so many different styles of music, each of which represents a class and type of passenger on the ship. Hats off to Mr. Horner! He is a genius! Not even the overrated but brilliant John Williams can match his creativity and talent! He should be worshiped, as should this movie.