NEW Jones/roache/somerville - Titanic (Blu-ray)

I am a historian, but I have also fairly accepted all Titanic movies and TV shows. So I will tell you about the Pros and Cons about this series and you can decide if you like it or not.

First off, let me say that I liked it. This series presented a new dynamic to seeing the Titanic and it also presented new real people who were on the ship (the Wideners, the Duff Gordons, and Dorothy Gibson are some examples). However, the first thing I will talk about is how the series is set up. The first three episodes have generally so many different point of views that are happening on the show. This is an awesome new way to look at a TV show, but you may not like this new style and thus the whole way the series is filmed will not be good for you. So in the end I liked this new dynamic, but depending who you are you may not like the way it is filmed with various point of views.

Now what are the plots? The good news is that this series did not generally rip off the popular James Cameron Titanic movie. This series does not really have a person from one class falling in love with another. Instead, there is a story in each class. The first episode will be off course first class where the wealthy elite of society are. The main character is the Earl of Manton is travelling with his wife Lady Manton and daughter Georgiana. Before the the voyage, Georgiana had ended up in jail and her father had to get her out. So Manton hopes to keep his daughter away from England while he goes to business in New York City. He also hopes she finds a husband. They also end up in conflict with some people who work for them in second class.

The second class story stars John Bately and his wife Muriel. John finds out his employer, the Earl of Manton, will be on board travelling first class. Bately is an attorney hired by Manton to hide a bad incident in his past. Muriel does not like her husband's business with people like the Earl of Manton.

Another story stars a perspective from the crew. Paolo, an Italian immigrant is travelling as a waiter in the first class dining room. He ends up falling in love with Annie, a maid for the second class passengers. The questions is if she will come with him to America and leave the ship when it docks in New York.

There are far more stories including one for third class, one for the captain and officers, and one for the private servants who work for the Mantons.

In terms of realism, the people a Titanic historian would know are all in the crew and are travelling first class and I will say some of them are not portrayed well as they seem really angry. That maybe the only problem.

Also don't expect to see a big Grand Staircase, or the lookouts before hitting the iceberg. Some of the effects are a little moderate.

Also one last thing, I really wanted to see more of some of the characters in the end because you will not really see all their fates.

The DVD hasn't been released here yet but the 'mini-series' is now over. It is difficult to call this amalgamation of snippets about an historic tragedy a miniseries because it was spread out so unevenly (3 hours on first night, one hour on second night) and we are now informed that the film is a total of 184 minutes which means that the fourth hour was completely filled with the most distracting and disrupting of commercials. Why this new version of TITANIC wasn't place on cable television where it could have been enjoyed on one uninterrupted three hour showing is beyond understanding. Perhaps when the DVD is released and there are no loud and ugly commercials every 5 minutes the story will hold together.

Julian Fellowes, so respected for his writing of such series as Downton Abbey, etc. seems to have the urge to tell the story of the event through quick snippets of personal stories among the passengers - a commendable idea, but when the tiny tales are buried in the almost immediate collision with the iceberg and the attempt to flesh out the story by making it about how tragedy affects people's relationships come as little disconnected pop-ups, it is difficult to care about anybody, much less get to know them well enough to remember them at picture's end. Granted there are some moments before the ship is finished that emphasize the fact that the unsinkable Titanic was rushed to completion before it was safely ready, and those flashbacks to offer some interesting moments.

But basically the story is the same as all the other TITANIC movies - a study about class distinction not only among the peerage of Brits but also the differentiation among first, second and third (steerage) classes - with a hefty dollop of snubbing the crass American passengers. Jon Jones directs this amalgamation of ideas. There are some brief but tasty moments for actors such as Glen Blackhall (a memorable Paolo) and Antonio Magro (Paolo's brother Mario), Peter McDonald, Steven Waddington, Ruth Bradley Linus Roache and Geraldine Somerville as the Mantons, Toby Jones and Maria Doyle Kennedy, Celia Emrie, James Wilby and Dragos Bucur (the stowaway Russian). The rest of the cast is so little used that they all but disappear.

The film was apparently shot on digital video. Some of the effects are fine, but the whole film lacks cohesion - at least on the American release on commercial televsion! Grady Harp, April 12

I was quite excited when I heard that Julian Fellowes had signed on to write a new miniseries exploring the legendary Titanic tragedy. Fellowes is the reigning champion of upstairs/downstairs drama as evidenced by his Oscar winning screenplay for Altman's "Gosford Park" and his wildly successful production of "Downton Abbey." While that upscale soap opera is currently all-the-rage, it seemed a prime opportunity for Fellowes to branch out. Without a doubt, the class divisions, struggles and tensions aboard the Titanic certainly appeared to match his previous themes. And yet, while the idea seemed like an easy home run, "Titanic" (for all its elegance) is lacking in character drama that makes one actually care. The passengers on this ill-fated voyage are only superficially presented and their back stories are largely uninspired or entirely predictable. While there are still some good elements to "Titanic," therefore, I never felt the time investment in watching the four part miniseries paid off in any appreciable way.

The shortcomings of this particular trip rests almost squarely on the unimaginative screenplay. While I liked the idea of the overlapping structure of the show (each part presents different characters during the same pivotal time frame), it was an interesting narrative device that really didn't amount to much. The huge cast is impressive, but the characters lack dimension. A few stand-outs include Linus Roache (perhaps my favorite character, seen only sporadically after the first episode) as a progressive Earl, Toby Jones (always reliable) as a second class passenger dealing with a disappointed wife (The Tudor's Maria Doyle Kennedy in the series' most thankless role), and Glen Blackhall as an Italian immigrant working on the ship. But these and many more great actors are given an array of lackluster cliche's to serve up.

Plotlines include undying new love in the upper class, undying new love in the lower decks (two characters spend about 30 minutes of real time together before committing to a future), a married woman with an unexplored attraction to an enigmatic stranger, and all the class snobbery that one might expect. A few of the story threads showed signs of life but never get developed beyond the most perfunctory way. And if you're just waiting for the climatic sinking sequence, it lacks any type of visual impact. In the end, it's all about who will live and who will die. And as the show drew to its conclusion, I realized I didn't really care much one way or another. Truly a disappointment! KGHarris, 4/12.