Titanic - Trivia, Questions and Fun Facts

[discussimdb]

Fan of Titanic or just want to share your movie knowledge? This topic is dedicated to all trivia and questions related to Titanic

[sara]

Of the seven actors who portrayed the ship's officers in the film, Edward Fletcher who starred as 6th Officer Moody was the only one of the group who wasn't of British origin. He was born in Massachusetts.

[carl]

With her nomination for Best Supporting Actress at age 87, Gloria Stuart became the oldest person to ever be nominated for an Oscar. Stuart held this record for 19 years when in 2018 Christopher Plummer was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at age 88. Stuart however, stills holds the record for oldest woman nominated in supporting actress.

[bernard]

The first movie to gross a billion dollars.

[maureen]

Mark Lindsay Chapman was fired and rehired twice, and survived an accident where he was struck by a boat and had to be pulled from the water.

[liam]

Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, whose careers skyrocketed following the film's release, both went on to win their first Oscars for Best Actor and Best Actress, respectively, for films starting with the the letter "R": DiCaprio won in 2016 for his role in The Revenant (2015); Winslet won in 2009 for her role in The Reader (2008).

[ella]

The history of the fictional Heart of the Ocean diamond is based on the early history of the real life Hope Diamond.

[fred]

The first film James Cameron ever directed that did not include or mention nuclear weapons.

[nina]

Due to enormous budget overruns, 20th Century Fox executives suggested an hour of specific cuts from the three-hour film. They argued the extended length would mean fewer showings, thus less money, even though long epics are more likely to help directors win Oscars. James Cameron refused, telling Fox, "You want to cut my movie? You're going to have to fire me! You want to fire me? You're going to have to kill me!" The executives did not want to start over, because it would mean the loss of their entire investment, but they also initially rejected Cameron's offer of forfeiting his share of the profits as an empty gesture; they felt that profits would be unlikely anyway. One executive who suggested that he also forfeit half his share of his next movie was angrily dismissed from Cameron's house. Amidst all the doubt, Cameron credits Sherry Lansing, head of co-producer Paramount at the time, for her continued support for the movie, even when no one else seemed to believe in it anymore. Cameron even screened a rough version of the film for Lansing on a small monitor at his own home, and her approval and helpful feedback were a turning point for him, confirming that he was on the right track with the movie, and that the three-hour running time was justified. Finally, all doubts held by the studios proved to be moot when the movie returned a giant profit by staying at the top of the box office for weeks, and held the record of highest-grossing film of all time for 12 years (until it was beaten by Cameron's own Avatar (2009)). Despite the huge profit, the studio initially tried to deny Cameron his back-end salary, but since they had rejected his forfeit offer, they were legally obliged to pay him an undisclosed sum.

[jeffrey]

Madame Bijoux was an elderly woman whom Jack Dawson had met in Paris. He claimed she came each night in the bar wearing all the jewelry she owned while "waiting for her long lost love". He had made a portrait of her and kept it in his sketchbook. Not only is the drawing based on a 1933 photograph called "Bijou" taken by famous photographer Brassaï but, similarly, the older Rose at the beginning of the film is in fact wearing several necklaces, bracelets, and rings and "waiting for her long lost love".

[sylvia]

Bill Paxton's fourth out of five collaborations with director James Cameron, following The Terminator (1984), Aliens (1986) and True Lies (1994). They later made Ghosts of the Abyss (2003) together, which became their final collaboration with Paxton's death in February 2017.

[nicholas]

Gloria Stuart was the only person involved in the production of the film who was actually living in 1912.

[jamie]

[June 2008] Ranked #6 on the American Film Institute's list of the 10 greatest films in the genre "Epic".

[steve]

Bill Paxton, Bernard Hill, and Victor Garber all narrated documentaries on the Titanic after the movie came out. Bernard Hill narrated Titanic: Secrets Revealed (1998), Victor Garber narrated Beyond Titanic (1998), and Bill Paxton narrated and starred in Ghosts of the Abyss (2003), which reunited him with James Cameron and Lewis Abernathy.

[jeffrey]

The crew felt that James Cameron had an evil alter ego, and nicknamed him "Mij" (Jim spelt backwards).

[kyle]

James Cameron's last film for 12 years as a writer and director until Avatar (2009). Between Titanic (1997) and Avatar (2009), James Cameron worked on the TV series Dark Angel (2000), which was canceled after 2 seasons.

[claude]

All the scenes with a shot of an exterior sunset were filmed at the Fox Studios south of Playas de Rosarito, Baja California, Mexico. The set was constructed specifically for the film, as no studio was large enough at the time to encompass the almost full-scale replication of the ship. James Cameron actually brought a large model of the Titanic and moved it around the 40-acre lot of recently acquired land to determine which place would have the best natural lighting conditions. When he finally found his preferred spot, he was told that that particular piece of land was not part of the lot. He simply replied "Then we'll need to buy this too".

[darrell]

In the scene of Rose looking through the corridors for Jack, the water used was actually from the Pacific Ocean at the Baja California, Mexico set. The water was so cold that when Rose gasps when she first dives into the water, it was actually Kate Winslet's genuine reaction to the frigid ocean.

[eli]

In the movie, Jack is a third-class passenger on the Titanic who sneaks his way up to first class with the hopes of never getting caught. In the real disaster in 1912, third-class passenger Hilda Maria Hellström really did sneak up to first class out of curiosity and never got caught, although she was in her third-class cabin when the Titanic hit an iceberg and ended up surviving the sinking by boarding one of the last lifeboats to leave, Collapsible C.

[tom]

Papers released by the Public Records Office in 1998 showed that third-class passengers were not locked below-decks.