Wouldn't the main character Jack Dawson, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, also fit on the door on which his lover Rose was floating after the ship sank?
Photo: LMK Media/ interTOPICS/ DDP
»Titanic« director James Cameron would like to end the discussion about the question of whether his classic film could not have had a happy ending after all – with the help of scientists.
"We conducted a scientific study to put an end to this whole thing once and for all and put a stake in her heart," the 68-year-old told the Toronto Sun.
The question is still hotly debated around 25 years after the box office hit (US theatrical release: December 19, 1997): If the main character Jack Dawson, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, hadn't also fitted the door on which his beloved Rose after the sinking of the ship drifted in the sea?
Cameron has had enough of the debate: the raft was replicated for his experiment.
Two stuntmen with the same body mass as the main characters, equipped with sensors, were placed in ice water to determine their chances of survival using various methods.
"He had to die"
The director summed up the result: »There was no way they both could have survived.
Only one survived.« In February, the experiment is to be shown in a special on »National Geographic«.
"Maybe in 25 years I won't have to deal with it anymore," says Cameron.
In the interview, Cameron underlined that he had no regrets about the ending: »He had to die.
It's like Romeo and Juliet.
It's a film about love and sacrifice and mortality.
Love is measured by the sacrifice it makes.«
It's not Cameron's first admission to the door controversy.
In 2017, he told Vanity Fair magazine, "Had he lived, the ending of the movie would have been meaningless." Shortly afterwards, Winslet said on Stephen Colbert's Late Show, "He just should have tried harder, on the door to come.” Winslet and Colbert reenacted the scene and showed: There would have been enough space!
Celine Dion, who sang the Titanic song "My Heart Will Go On," suspected in 2019 that Jack was so frozen from the cold ocean water that he no longer had the strength to jump on the door.
Also in 2019, DiCaprio was asked about it in an interview by MTV broadcaster Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie.
Unlike Cameron, Winslet, and Dion, DiCaprio simply said, "No comment."
wit/dpa
