This article was originally published on JustStarz
The movie Titanic is known as one of the greatest love stories of all time. James Cameron's masterpiece of cinema about the famous cruise liner's sinking was the first movie to gross a billion dollars and remained the world's top-selling film for twelve years before being dethroned! But the motion picture isn't without its flaws. And while we'll always love the iconic classic, we'll never watch it the same way after seeing these mistakes.
The Chances of Jack and Rose Meeting in Real Life Were Zero
Every once in a while, a director has to make an executive decision to save the film's plot, even if that decision is unrealistic. In the case of Titanic, that's what James Cameron had to do when he decided the movie would portray passengers of different classes intermingling. On the real RMS Titanic, passengers in the various classes would've been strictly kept separate from one another. So, there's very little chance that Jack and Rose would have ever met.
This was common practice on major cruise liners back in the day as it was supposed to keep passengers relatively quarantined should disease break out in one set of cabins.
Only a Magician Could've Opened That Door
People underestimate how serious the effects of hypothermia can be. That's why a number of scientists and doctors pointed out that Titanic's depictions of the effects of the freezing sea were inaccurate. For example, the scene where Jack and Rose have to open the gate underwater would've been nearly impossible, even for a trained magician! Fumbling around for the key in all that freezing water would've made it impossible for them to unlock the gate.
Of course, this is a pretty important scene for the movie's sake. So, if you're willing to look over it, we're also willing to turn a blind eye.
Did She Remove All The Glass Or Not?
We see continuity errors in almost every major television show or movie. Directors try to keep these to a minimum, but when handling hundreds of hours of different takes of material, something will get lost in the shuffle. In Titanic, the most apparent continuity slip occurs when Rose uses the fire axe. First, she takes all the glass out of the frame to remove the axe from the inside. But, one shot later, the glass is back.
As we said, you can't really fault them for this one. And it's far from the worst continuity slip we've seen. The creators of Game of Thrones left a Starbucks cup in one of the frames, which is way worse.
Who's Going to Tell Jack That Lake Didn't Exist in 1912?
In one scene of Titanic, Jack is talking to Rose and trying to stop her from jumping into the ocean and committing suicide. To do this, he tells her a story about ice fishing back in Wisconsin. Here's the one problem: the lake that Jack is talking about wasn't created until 1918, after the Chippewa River was dammed, and that was six years after the Titanic sank. So, it looks like someone forgot to do their historical research on local bodies of water.
At least his advice worked. But he probably should've remembered that same story when it was time for him and Rose to climb onto that door.
The Odds of Jack Successfully Holding Rose for 37 Seconds Are Low
Towards the front end of the film, Rose winds up agreeing to do what Jack says, and she lets him dangle her off a ledge for a while. It's a stressful scene that worries us every time, even if we know how it's going to end. Still, to hold another fully grown person up for a whole 37 seconds like that is probably something that someone would need to train for.
If this had been real life, Rose probably would've slipped off, which would've been the end of things. But this is Hollywood, so the show must go on!
A Church Song From 35 Years Into the Future
We're not sure who was in charge of the historical research for this film, but they dropped the ball on different occasions. Take the Sunday morning church scene, for example. In the movie, the church patrons sing, "Save all who dare the eagle's flight / And keep them by thy watchful care / From every peril in the air." One problem: the American Air Force and this hymn weren't invented until some 35 years after the Titanic sank.
This should have been an easy enough inaccuracy for the film's creators to catch beforehand. But, they were probably too worried about all the other little mistakes piling up.
The Infamous Boiler Room Scene
We love when movies throw out the basic rules of physics so that characters can get a little taste of love. Titanic is no exception if you all remember the scene in the boiler room where Jack and Rose start kissing. To make this movie, we're sure the film's creators had to study the actual Titanic. As such, they would've realized that everything in the boiler room (including the dirty air) would've been filled with thick, black soot.
We understand that Jack and Rose needed to have a romantic moment alone, but lets at least leave the ship with its integrity, no?
Rose's Gown Was Too Thin
During the filming of the iceberg scenes, a lot of Titanic's cast members got to wear special wetsuits to protect them against the chill of the movie studio waters. However, Kate Winslet's Rose had to continue wearing only a thin dress to make the film look more realistic. Unfortunately, if we were being totally realistic, wearing this dress into the Atlantic that night would've meant that Rose would die before even making it to the door.
While filming this movie, Kate Winslet wound up almost drowning and got low-grade hypothermia. When watching it back, you can see how hard she's working, and maybe that's one of the reasons we love this film so much.
In Real Life, Rose Never Would've Worn That Lipstick
In Titanic, Kate Winslet is supposed to play a privileged, upper-class English girl. And, in the early 1900s, girls of this stature rarely wore makeup. Apparently, it was reserved for girls of lower classes and felt to be showy and unnecessary by most elites. That being said, Rose doesn't shy away from that particularly deep shade of rose in the film, and we can't say we mind it at all.
Still, seeing how everyone would've looked in an actual period dress would be interesting.
How'd They Get Into That Car so Easily?
There's always been something that bothers us about that scene where Jack and Rose get together in the back of the car in the Titanic's storage hold. Can you figure out what we're going to say? No, it has nothing to do with the amount of steam. We're curious how they got into those locked cars. Is Jack also a lock picker on top of being an orphan, a world traveler, and an expert poker player?
There were cars aboard the Titanic in real life. But they were most certainly all locked.
Rose Actually Missed the Cuffs and Cut His Hand
One of the most stressful scenes of Titanic is when Rose has to cut Jack free of his handcuffs using the fire ax. She lines up, closes her eyes, and then takes the shot, freeing Jack from his constraints. However, if you slow down the scene, you can see that Winslet slammed the ax down on DeCaprio's fake prop hand. If they weren't using props, she would've taken his actual hand off in this scene. Ouch!
Granted, this also would have freed Jack from his handcuffs. But, it probably would've crushed the whole romantic aspect of the movie, what with blood gushing out.
Uh Oh - Someone Forgot to Cover the Stunt Rig
Being a stuntman is a dangerous job on a movie set. You have to take on the most hazardous shots of the film. However, you also have to depend on the prop and stunt directors to set up your stunt correctly and then hope you don't get hurt. And if the director doesn't have the angle right, then the illusion will be ruined, which is exactly what happened in this scene of Titanic.
In this scene, a man is pulled under after a hole opens in the ship's deck. But, if you slow the shot down, you can see him being pulled out of frame by a series of wires.
The Luxuries the Ship Actually Carried
In order to try to show audiences how prestigious the Titanic's first voyage was supposed to be, the creative team took a few liberties when describing the boat's cargo load. At the time, the Titanic was seen as a spectacle of wealth and luxury, so to help modern-day audiences (who are already used to giant cruise ships), they added false details like there being paintings by Picasso and Monet on board.
In reality, none of these paintings were actually on board the real Titanic. However, if anyone was wondering, the paintings in the film absolutely and unequivocally sink.
The Titanic Wasn't Labeled "unsinkable" Until Years After Its Sinking
If anyone reading this had to learn about Titanic in school, you'll remember the often-repeated false claim about the boat being entirely unsinkable! Yet even though the engineers had used a new system of compartments in the ship's lower decks, there still were many ways the boat could sink, as we saw. But did you know that this false rumor about the Titanic being unsinkable came about years after the ship sunk?
This means that no one would have actually believed the boat to be unsinkable at the time of the voyage. But they probably didn't expect things to go that far south, either.
The Casting Directors Forgot to Tell This Little Kid to Act Sad
If you're filming a big movie, chances are you'll need a lot of extras. These extra bodies make the difference between a film set feeling real and feeling like a sound stage. Even then, once you get the extra bodies you need, you must make sure they behave themselves. You don't want to hire someone like that one kid on the Titanic who continues to laugh and smile while everyone around them is screaming.
It's possible that the kid was doing this just because he wasn't sure what was happening during filming. Still, we're not exactly sure why the directors kept it in the film.
Rose Knew About Freud's Theories Before the Rest of the World
Rose's character endears herself to the hearts of many viewers when she swiftly quips back at the Titanic's director, Bruce Ismay, with a biting reference to his manhood. In the scene, she comments that he might be interested in Sigmund Freud's work about compensation and relates it to the size of the massive Titanic. Ismay is, in turn, dismayed. However, what really bothers us about this scene is that Freud hadn't published any of his work yet.
It wasn't until 1919 that those ideas became mainstream knowledge, and the Titanic sank in 1912.
A Cameraman Cameo During This Famous Scene
In one of the film's most classic scenes, Jack is welcomed into first class, and we get to witness a long, single-take, first-person shot that is supposedly Jack's perspective going through the cabins. However, at one point, "Jack" walks up to a set of glass doors, and we realize that we do not see the film through his eyes at all. In the reflection of the glass instead is a cameraman and his rig, and the filmmakers completely forgot to edit him out.
We're sure this wasn't what James Cameron meant to do during this scene, but it is pretty cool for that cameraman and his family that he got to make a cameo like that.
Rose's Beauty Mark Is Always Moving
We never thought about this before, but during the filming of Titanic, the directors had to ensure that it always looked like the boat was traveling in the right direction. They couldn't turn back for Southhampton just a few days in now, could they? So several shots were flipped during post-production to ensure it always looked like the ship was going in the right direction. Because of this, Rose's birthmark changes sides multiple times throughout the film.
Another of these famous missteps was the inclusion of a left-handed crank camera in the film, which wouldn't have been popular in 1912. They probably filmed it with a righty and then switched the shot, but still, it's a mistake.
CGI Mistakes Weren't Lacking
Unlike his later box-office blowout, Avatar, James Cameron was committed to using as few instances of CGI in Titanic as possible. This was no easy task, but on the more complex issues, he was willing to fold and let the computer wizards help out. Unfortunately, this created a whole new set of problems in a number of scenes. At some points, there are vanishing objects. At others, the pipes on the ship change shape.
For a mid-90s film, the CGI in Titanic still holds up pretty well. But, the mistakes are pretty glaring once you finally notice them.
Could They Actually Have Fit On The Door Or Not?
We've seen the diagrams online a million times. Ever since Titanic came out, people have been convinced that Jack could have fit on the door frame with Rose and escaped the accident. However, there seems to be an equal number of people who are convinced that if Jack had climbed on, the frame would've tipped, killing them both. What do you believe? Should he have tried a little harder to hang on?
At the end of the day, with the exposure she'd already suffered, Rose most likely would've died in this accident as well. A door frame or not, hypothermia is hypothermia.
The Statue Of Liberty Should've Been Brown
It wasn't until we started going through and compiling all of these mistakes that we started to get a little frustrated with Titanic. All of these years, we've taken a lot of things at face value, and the film's researchers didn't even bother to read what was going on in 1912! In this latest instance of historical inaccuracy, Rose arrives in New York after the disaster and is greeted by a green Statue of Liberty.
Back in 1912, the statue was still mostly the brown, coppery color it arrived with from France. Also, the golden flame didn't come about until the 80s.
The Constellations They Saw Were Totally Wrong
Neil DeGrasse Tyson figured out this particular mistake in Titanic a few years ago. The American astrophysicist watched the film and then found himself scratching his head, wondering if those were the constellations and star systems that Jack and Rose would've been looking at that night. Do you want to know what he found out? Those are not the constellations they would've been seeing and solely serves to push the film's plot forward.
After realizing this, DeGrasse Tyson did James Cameron a huge favor and gave him a copy of the star map from that particular night. Cameron even used this (correct) map in the 3D remaster of Titanic!
The Titanic Did Carry the Required Amount of Lifeboats
There's a common misconception about the Titanic that the movie doesn't help to dispel. This misconception is that the boat's operators were in some way at fault for the loss of life during the sinking because they didn't have the required number of lifeboats on board. However, in actuality, the Titanic had precisely as many lifeboats as were legally required. This means there still wasn't enough to save every person, but the operators weren't legally at fault.
Thankfully, since the days of the Titanic sinking, transportation standards have gotten better across the board. Maritime voyages, drives, and train rides are all much safer today than they were then.
Is Rose Really Packing That Type Of Power?
Even though some movies are beloved for how realistic the fight scenes are, we have a feeling Titanic is not one of those films. The film's love story and the massive undertaking James Cameron pursued to make the sinking look realistic both got much more attention than any of the film's fight scenes did. That's why we have so much trouble with that scene during the sinking where Rose punches a crewman. There's no way she had that kind of power.
This also was a poor attempt to film a fight scene, to be honest. After being hit, the crewman has blood on his hands but not his face and then wipes it all over the place with the camera watching.
Cameron Brutally Defamed Real Life Titanic Officer
In one particular scene of Titanic, First Officer William Murdoch shoots several passengers before turning his gun on himself. The scene is supposed to show the extreme pressure of the situation and more concretely place the blame for the accident on the boat's operators. However, there isn't enough concrete evidence to pin First Officer Murdoch as the person who committed these heinous acts on board the Titanic. In fact, the idea that there was a suicide on board is still widely disputed.
James Cameron later apologized to the Murdoch family for his portrayal of the man responsible for the boat in her final hours.
It Seems Like Time Isn't Linear in the Titanic Universe
We've caught this happening in the film so many times at this point that we're convinced that maybe it was actually on purpose. In one scene, Jack is talking with Rose about what he can't wait to do once he arrives back in the United States. One thing he mentions is the infamous rollercoaster on the Santa Monica pier. Sounds like a good time, right? Only one problem, the rollercoaster didn't exist in 1912.
The land sale and permits to build an amusement park out on the pier weren't finalized until 1916, four years after the Titanic sank. So, maybe Jack was just a ghost this whole time. Otherwise, we're not sure how he knew that information.
The Ship Was Going the Wrong Way
We discussed earlier that a number of issues arose because James Cameron was constantly trying to ensure that the cameras captured the Titanic moving in the correct direction. However, in that scene where Jack and Rose are practicing spitting off the deck, we can tell they're on the boat's port side and traveling North-West. That's great, except for one problem: the Titanic was traveling South-West at this point.
We have to admit as well that we weren't huge fans of this scene in the first place. All it seems to do is encourage kids to spit off the top of amusement park rides.
The Man Who Was Stronger Than A Capstan
As we discussed before, James Cameron wanted to avoid using CGI as much as possible on the set of Titanic. But that meant he had to improvise when it came to many of his props. For example, for the Titanic's capstans (a big steel cylinder used to wind rope), Cameron had foam pieces created to resemble the capstans but not overload the set. Unfortunately, this meant that when someone hit one of them during the sinking, you could see the foam's outline after the fact.
This isn't the biggest issue that Titanic has. Everything is so chaotic during these scenes that we don't focus on this as much as we focus on some of the historical inaccuracies.
Where Did Jack's Suspenders Go?
We've already discussed Old Handless Jack and how that scene with the handcuffs and the ax would've actually gone a lot different in real life. However, there's something else going on in this scene that you might not have noticed. As Jack stands and braces for Rose to cut his handcuffs off, we notice that he's wearing suspenders. But, once she swings the ax and breaks the cuffs, those suspenders are gone.
We can't imagine this was a purposeful choice. What must've happened was they were filming this scene, took a break, and when they came back after a bit, Leo must've just forgotten his suspenders!
The Windows Break In Different Orders
As the bridge is swallowed up by the waves during the Titanic's sinking, there's one particularly poignant shot of the windows breaking as the water finally breaks into the room. However, Cameron wanted to make sure he got as much good footage as he could from this scene and therefore reshot it a number of times from a number of different angles. The result? Every time, the windows break and give way in a different order.
The first time you see the shot, the windows break from left to right in order. In another shot, a few of them blow out at the same time.
Is That Water The Right Color?
Even though a lot of them look pretty similar, every beach and body of water in the world is different. The composition of sand, the depth of the water, and the conditions of the waves will all affect how rough the seas are and how murky the depths will look. In Titanic, they had to sacrifice some realism to make a more appealing shade of water.
In real life, the North Atlantic is swimming with sea creatures like sharks, dolphins, and whales. The water is also incredibly dark and murky, so it would have looked nothing like the water in the Titanic film.
Titanic's Operator Didn't Selfishly Disguise Himself as a Woman
James Cameron's Titanic was a major proponent in spreading a rumor that the operator of the Titanic, Bruce Ismay of the White Star Line, dressed like a woman in order to more easily escape the Titanic. However, in other accounts of the sinking, Ismay is said to have saved a number of passengers before disembarking himself. While we'll never know the real story, Cameron was playing with fire here, talking about real people instead of just Jack and Rose!
Unfortunately, we'll never be truly sure what happened on the decks of the Titanic that night. But, if the movie version is what you want to believe, go right ahead.
The Life Boats Don't Respond To Gravity
While filming the sinking of his fake Titanic, James Cameron had to compromise on several things to choose the best-looking shot for his film. One of the compromises he has to make is that a number of the exterior components of the boat are fixed. That means that even when it starts listing, and gravity would've forced one of the lifeboats to swing out from the boat, it stays perfectly still.
We understand why Cameron had to make the changes that he did, but this scene takes us out of it every time. We're always expecting the lifeboat to swing, or fall, or something, but nothing ever occurs.
Rose's Lifeboat Went up and Down and up Again
As Titanic is sinking and Rose and Jack are trying to fight their way off the ship, there's a peculiar set of scenes with the rowboats that we can't quite explain. It starts with Rose getting into a lifeboat and then being lowered about ten feet off the ship's deck. Then, Jack keeps talking, and Rose supposedly keeps descending. But, next time we see her, she's even higher up and closer to the deck!
There are a number of mistakes in this movie, thanks to shoddy CGI or a lack of continuity, and unfortunately, this is just another to add to the list.
Are They Turning to Port or Starboard?
As the crew of the Titanic reacts to try and avoid the iceberg, they shout out commands like "Hard to Starboard" and "Hard to Port." These are typical nautical terms meaning turn the boat hard to the right or the left. However, a bunch of amateur mariners saw this film and believed that Cameron's characters got their directions wrong. When we go back and watch the scene, we're not actually so sure.
Apparently, the definitions for port and starboard changed over time, so this may just be one of the only instances where Cameron's Titanic hits the historical fact on the button.
Jack's Hair Is Its Own Living Being
So many people spend their teenage years (and early 20s) trying to emulate Jack from Titanic, both with romanticism and the hair. But, in one particular scene in the film, Jack is walking around with his hair unkempt, and immediately after spying Rose, he has it slicked back. However, we never see Jack actually do his hair. Did it slick itself back? Is there a hidden barber in this scene we don't know about?
What most likely happened is the costume department couldn't decide whether they wanted Jack to play it loose or slicked back and took takes using both hairstyles. Afterward, the editor probably just didn't spot the difference.
The Ship's Architecture Kept Changing
The number of sets studios needed to make to film this movie was exorbitant. There were even multiple sets for the same ship's parts so that Cameron could film things from different angles. However, this created continuity issues where audiences started noticing pieces of the ship that looked different in various scenes. For example, every time we see the ship's bow from a new angle, the railing looks like it has an entirely different shape.
The gap in the rails seems to be shrinking and growing every time Rose and Jack wind up there. Maybe some viewers don't notice it, but it bothered us immensely.
In Reality, They Would've Never Escaped
At the end of the day, Titanic is a movie about a real-life tragedy. And, if we want to view this film through the realistic lens of that tragedy, then we have to be honest with ourselves: there is no way Rose and Jack would've escaped. They had to get through multiple locked gates and up and out to the top deck from the third-class passage, all while the boat was already sinking.
What we know from the actual disaster is that most of the passengers on the third-class deck drowned. So, we love the love story here, but it's just not realistic at the end of the day.
The First Titanic Film
There's plenty to be said about James Cameron's mistakes in Titanic. But, the most egregious mistake of all had nothing to do with James Cameron at all. In 1912, just 29 days after the Titanic disaster occurred, a news team released footage of the sinking and of some of the traumatized passengers. That's too soon if we've ever seen it, but it seems as if Hollywood studios wasted no time back in the day.
At the end of the day, regardless of any issues we might have with the movies made about the event, the sinking of the Titanic remains a global disaster that the world just can't forget.
Flashlights Weren't As Commonly Used Back Then
In Titanic, we see a number of crew members scrouging around the ship with flashlights looking for passengers to save. However, in 1912 at the time of the sinking, flashlights were not a commodity that many maritime vessels carried. Any flashlights used to help look for people most likely belonged to wealthy passengers. That being said, this mistake doesn't take us out of the film as much as some of the other, more ridiculous ones do.
At the time of the sinking, flashlights were barely ten years old as an invention. So, we understand why they weren't being widely used yet. But that sure might've helped.