Sail of the century

It sank five days later.

James Cameron's Titanic sets sail on Friday.

Cameron, the Canadian-born director of such epics as Terminator, The Abyss and True Lies, proudly announces that at $200 million US, and a running time of 197 minutes, his Titanic is the longest, finest, most spectacular film of 1997.

He insists that even though Titanic must make $500 million to break even, it will not sink the two studios, Paramount and 20th Century-Fox, that financed the epic.

"We're dealing with a global market that can easily return $500 million. I'm really dismayed that our budget is seen as a negative factor," says Cameron.

In the days of Cecil B. DeMille, Stanley Kubrick and David Lean, the studios used to brag about the budgets of their epics.

"It was a way of telling people just how much value they were getting for their entertainment dollar,'' explains Cameron. "The audience is the great vindicator. Only they can tell Hollywood if we've reached the saturation point with event pictures.

"If they refuse to support these pictures, studios will stop making them and I for one will likely be out of a job.

"I have always wanted to make epics. I know I could run off with a company of actors and make a small, independent film but that's not where my interests lie."

Cameron also claims that "on a minute-per-minute basis, Titanic cost less than Speed 2 or Starship Troopers. We run 197 minutes and they are both under two hours.''

Cameron says he used almost half of his $200-million budget to build a 90%-scale ocean liner at a 40-hectare make-shift studio in Rosarito Beach, Mexico and then to recreate the interiors on sound stages.

"Our Titanic is meant to be a time machine. We wanted to put the audience on the ship so we had to recreate the opulence and that takes money."

Titanic was not originally budgeted at $200 million. The costs kept escalating during production. Cameron says that in retrospect he would have "cut out some of the spectacle.

"The spectacle is what gets people into the theatres but it's the characters they ultimately connect with. I feel that it is the love story at the heart of our movie that people are going to remember and it will be the love story that will bring them back for a second and third viewing."

Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet play Jack and Rose, the film's star-crossed teenage lovers. She is the fiancee of a wealthy industrialist (Billy Zane). He is a sketch artist who won passage on the Titanic's third-class-level in a poker game.

"Our movie is less about the Titanic than it is about Jack and Rose. That is why once the ship sets sail and Jack and Rose meet, we don't pull away to show the ship heading toward the iceberg.

"Everyone knows that the ship sank after hitting an iceberg. We don't have to keep foreshadowing that moment."

Once the Titanic strikes the iceberg, the film's focus switches to the ship itself.

"I knew we had to do a really great job of the actual sinking. Audiences are going to expect that from us. They're going to demand it.

"What they see is what actually happened."

Cameron first decided to make a film about the Titanic in 1991.

"I have been fascinated with the sea since I was a kid growing up near Niagara Falls. Those Jacques Costeau documentaries were my favorite programs."

Once he had sketched his love story, Cameron went to Moscow to convince a team of Russian scientists and divers to take him to the Titanic's graveyard in the Atlantic.

"I made 12 dives in 21 days. I actually spent more hours observing the wreck than the passengers spent on the ship.

"I know other people have, but I didn't experience a great emotional reaction to the wreck. I was being too analytical. It was as if I was on some kind of space mission."

There is already a fierce industry buzz about Titanic's chances of dominating the Oscar nominations in February. But Cameron is cautious.

"The industry is only interested in me for technical Oscars so the whole idea of an Oscar nomination is foreign to me.

"I'm not Hollywood's favorite guy. I can't see the Oscar committee nominating me for writing or directing but I would hope they might look at the fine performances my actors gave me."

Cameron made the biggest sacrifice of his career to complete Titanic the way he wanted to.

He refused to allow the film to open in the summer so he could trim 20 minutes from its original running time, and he returned his complete directing fee.

"I wanted to prove that I was being completely responsible. There was so much talk about this being an ego trip and it wasn't.

"I was always just trying to make the best possible film I could. By returning my director's fee, I was saying I had as much of a commitment to the film's success as the studios did."