National Geographic Video: Secrets of the Titanic

As I wrote in a review of the 1958 A Night to Remember, I am convinced that the ultimate Titanic story has yet to be told. While that version is about as good as the existing Hollywood versions get, Nicolas Noxon's National Geographic: Secrets of the Titanic (1986) is still the best Titanic story on celluloid, for MY money. It has as much drama and pathos as any of the movie versions and is even more riveting than the Hollywood accounts. I wish future studio directors would take time to absorb some of Noxon's class and savvy before filming.

If any real Titanic or shipwreck fan has NOT seen this 1986 documentary in its entirety-or has not seen it since it first came out, he/she needs to do so. While some additional evidence has been unearthed since it was made, it capsualizes the events very concisely and powerfully. I enjoyed the huge four-volume set someone produced a couple of years ago. Yet it lost in bulk and repetitiveness anything it might have held in advantage over Noxon's film.

The film consists of two parallel stories taking place at once. Bob Ballard and his crew are searching for the long-lost Titanic. Meanwhile, we see the `huge mound of steel taking shape' in the Irish shipyards. We learn about the building of this behemoth and the Gilded Age in which it was designed, as we see the underwater explorers trying to do the impossible. It is tempting today to forget that the Titanic was lost for three-quarters of a century. Noxon dramatizes this to its utmost. `The Titanic: no longer lost, no longer legend,' narrator Martin Sheen reminds us, as we see the ghostly underwater images.

Everything about this film is well-done. The historic montages are excellent and in only a couple of instances have Noxon's facts been challenged by later data. To me, the human disaster is actually brought home more poignantly than in any of the Hollywood films about the disaster. Of course, Ballard was and is a class act. His reverence and respect for the wreck site is admirable. The pirating of Titanic, Lusitania and others in recent years is, to me, deplorable. The fact that Ballard was unable to talk about the Titanic for months after its initial discovery speaks volumes about the man.

In just 51 minutes, Noxon makes us really feel the tragedy and irony of the most famous naval disaster in history and the also the exultation and saddened awe of the most famous undersea discovery of all time. It is a pity it is no longer available on video and not yet available on DVD in the United States. (Fortunately I have an aging tape, recorded from an early 1990s broadcast of it.) If the opportunity presents itself to view, copy, rent or buy this outstanding film in any format, I strongly urge one to do so. For my money, this is still the best telling of the Titanic story on film.

Secrets of the Titanic (1986)

**** (out of 4)

Marvelous 51-minute documentary tells the story of the Titanic, the legendary ship that hit an iceberg on April 14, 1912 and sank hours later killing 1517 people. Over seventy years later Dr. Robert Ballard set out on a mission to try and locate the final resting place of the ship and he finally achieved his dream on the early hours of September 1, 1985. This documentary takes us to the ship for the very first time and it also shows some new evidence on the various theories that had happened. Since this documentary first aired there have been many other voyages down to the Titanic and God knows many of them used higher technology, which resulted in more clarity and better pictures. With that said, there's still something so haunting about seeing this original voyage and especially the scene where the crew first come across the ship. It's quite haunting seeing these pictures and it's especially amazing that they were able to find it in the first place. The documentary not only tells the story of the Titanic but it also talks about the mission to try and locate it. Another fascinating thing are all the incredible shots of the ship and various bits of wreckage that are on the ocean floor. If you have seen more recent documentaries you know that everything is slowly falling apart so these images here are some of the best that you are ever going to see. Martin Sheen does a remarkable job with his narration as well. SECRETS OF THE TITANIC is certainly a historic documentary and it's also one of the most powerful out there.

I went through a brief Titanic phase as a teen and it was largely due to this special. Here, the grand oceanliner is portrayed as a monument to human achievement, and then the film promptly plunges you into the deep to survey what remains of her today (in '86 at least). The sight of the ruins almost make this kind of a ghost story, by virtue of the robotic camera footage and Martin Sheen's server narration detail of the ship's final moments before sinking. This is a fascinating documentary and an excellent starting point in anyone's Titanic research.

Dr. Bob Ballard is one of my favorite people of all time. It is he who helped discover Titanic's location. I remember watching this special after TBS aired the film S.O.S. Titanic from 1979. During this special, you can't help but be moved and touched. Dr. Ballard never wanted Titanic to be seen as a place for scavengers. He wanted it preserved from it's legacy. Sadly, every since the discovery 20 years ago, people like film director James Cameron and others have visited this holy site where over a thousand people died, some of their bodies have never been recovered. I remember the film that aired right before the special and I still have that tape believe it or not. I have a couple of the Titanic copies by the National Geographic Special. I also have A Night to Remember tapes as well but I can't watch any of them. I even have James Cameron's Titanic but I can't watch it neither. Titanic has always had a place in my heart. While the film, S.O.S. Titanic, never spent so much money, I remember the closing shot of the film and Titanic's deck chairs in the snow-capped ocean. It reminded me of her and all those lost among them. Anyway, Bob Ballard brought a lot of respect and dignity to the ship itself. He never forgot the thousand of people who died. He never picked up a souvenir. His souvenir to all of us was finding her as she deteriorates more and more each day. Like a one time beauty queen who left the limelight, Titanic has become older, frail, and taken by time and the elements. We will never forget the legacy of Titanic. As Susan St. James' character said in the film before the special; "I won't feel safe again."

Once thought "unsinkable" - The RMS Titanic now sits, in its watery grave, at the very bottom of the Atlantic Ocean (2.5 miles down).

Join Dr. Robert Ballard and his diligent research team as they triumphantly become the very first to locate, photograph, and explore (through high-tech robotic cameras) this famed wreckage 74 years after its sinking in 1912.

Presented by "National Geographic" - This intriguing, 50-minute historical documentary was originally filmed back in 1986 - But, it still holds some relevance today, 32 years later.