I can no longer brag about never having watched
_Titanic_, although streaming it with a quarter
of my attention is barely "watching." I still
don't understand its popularity. (One admirer
was a male highschool ex-friend who also loved
_Happy Together_, but watched this turkey 20+
times.)

The early goings are promising, I have to admit.
Kate Winslet is ravishingly photographed, the
natural light bouncing off her reddish gold hair;
as a 1910s trophy-wife-to-be, she has genuine
nuances in her expressions. DiCaprio isn't half
annoying as a penniless portraitist who courts
her. Alas, it can't last. Soon she resorts to
her patented vulgar overacting style, giving people
the finger, going full-on seductress in a fashion
generation Z may find too forward. A telling
scene: she horse-collar tackles Victor Garber
from behind to get his attention, in a way that
would have earned a 15-yard penalty in the NFL.
Garber, a consummate theater actor, turns around
to face her and shows how it is done. He plays
the ship-builder and his agonized, conflicted
look and gesture makes Winslet look like the
dilettante that she is. DiCaprio also starts
getting on my nerves, although truth be told,
he is saddled with some awful lines.

The film is basically _Aliens_ redux. Winslet
is Weaver, her mother Frances Fisher is the
corporate weasel played by Paul Reiser,
DiCaprio is Michiel Biehn, the Titanic is the
planet about to be nuked (the water-filled
corridors might have been the same sets for
the colonial station), Billy Zane's minions
are the face huggers, while he himself is the
queen alien (with less empathy and nobility).
Who is the robot? The most memorable scene
might be that Lars von Trier actress falling
to her death right in front of Winslet. And
I don't even like von Trier.

---------------------------------------------------

I have never liked _Titane_ much either. It
is never made clear what makes Vincent Lindon
a more worthy parent than the Agathe Rousselle's
character's original parents, whom she presumably
burns to death? His celebrity status? If director
Ducournau were male, we would have had issues
with her making Rousselle (with bound breasts)
less murderous, almost a functioning member
of society, once she is in the male fratenity
of fire fighters. But maybe I am interpreting
this all wrong. Maybe the murderous, car-
obsessed anti-heroine, who copulates with a
muscle car, oozes motor oil, and dies giving
birth to a hybrid (anti-"star child"), is the
very embodiment of the destruction of our
planet via gasoline consumption. I can find
no English-language critique which has this
interpretation. Then again, climate change
is all but banished from the progressive
culture warriors' pop culture agenda because
of their other priorities. (150 million
women don't have federal guaranteed abortion
rights and *their* plight is not a priority
either.)

When I can stomach Kristin Stewart again I'll
catch that other body-horror film, Cronenberg's
_Crimes of the Future_, Will I find hidden
allusions to cloning, getting ugly tattoos,
plastic surgeries, and that other kind of
elective surgery that no critic dares to talk
about?