S.O.S. Titanic

This is an intelligent mans' version of the Titanic tragedy & possibly my favorite film on the disaster. An ambitious production, it was filmed in England, Nova Scotia & Long Beach. It has the distinction of being the first Titanic movie filmed in color albeit for television. Contrary to previous posts it does not, to my knowledge, use recycled(colorized)footage from A Night To Remember. Bothe films use the newsreel footage of the original Queen Elizabeth being launched as a stand in for Titanic. If this had been made for the big screen it probably would've been better received as well as being better known today. The movie is based primarily on a book by 2nd Class pasenger/survivor Lawrence Beasley. Beasley's book came out in June 1912 only two months after the real disaster. So his recollections, such as getting into a lifeboat with his pajamas on, was still quite fresh and not diluted by forty or fifty years of time. Beesley is played here by David Warner who was the bodyguard Spicer in the Cameron-Titanic film. The film makers shot the picture in a sort of muted colors. that is to say what would be the opposite of splashy Technicolor. The 3rd Class gets the good treatment in this film. the scenes showing the Irish immigrants being ferried out to the liner are well done. Also the Phun Boats that marketed over priced Irish goods to wealthy ocean liner passengers. Beasley & his female consort Leigh Goodwin stand in for the generic 2nd Class passengers...adding to our consciousness the plights of the haves(1st Class)& the have nots(3rd Class). Some characterizations stand out: Maurice Roeves as stoker Fred Barrett, Geoffrey Whitehead as Thomas Andrews(he favors the real Andrews), Ian Holm as the best Bruce Ismay of any of the Titanic movies, Chloris Leachman as Molly Brown, David Janssen & Beverly Ross as the Astors, Harry Andrews as Captain Smith, Susan Saint James as a dignified Leigh Goodwin & D.Warner as a very thoughtful Lawrence Beasley. Exterior shots of the Queen Mary in Long Bch are obvious but it never hampens the story. It's just good film making to make the QM look like the Titanic. The soundtrack is excellent, mixed with elegant tunes from the period, from Victor Herbert to Scott Joplin as well as the film's original score. Particularly nice is the middle eastern theme playing while the women get a massage & their hair done as well as many other themes. Characters are included in this film that are left out in others ie: Leigh Goodwin, the two boot cleaners, Alvie the elevator boy, 1st Class stewardess Violet Jessop, Fred Barrett, Rene Harris etc. The film is wonderfully paced & takes it's time. The full uncut version(with Carpathia rescue at beginning)can run on t.v. for 3hrs. This is the version I'd recommend not the cut 90 min home vid version. There are long scenes of passengers going about their business like the elderly lady just sitting in her deck chair enjoying the excitement. This most likely was 1st Class passenger Emily Ryerson because the actress is made up to look just like a photo of Ryerson. The sinking of the ship is handled very well & shot from many of the passengers' points of view. There's no ship shown breaking in half as this was 1978 and before the wreck of the real ship was found. But the producers couldn't have been far off from the truth the way it is presented her.

Discrepancies abound as in every Titanic film. Violet Jessop while included here is shown as an old woman stewardess, not the young 25 yr old w/artist model looks that she was in 1912. Chief Officer,who drowned, is accurately shown writing a letter to his sister which he did but the film shows him writing words that 1st Officer Lighttoller had written in his own account of the sinking years later. And as stated earlier the QM is so obviously not the Titanic. Also the crew of the Carpathia are shown making rescue preparations at the site of the sinking instead of enroute to it.

So sit back and enjoy the Titanic tragedy events re-enacted sumptuously. Like I stated, it's a well mae & ambitious production intended for television at that. It gets a 9 out of 10 from me.

In 1979, this Titanic film did not have the grand special effects like any other movie. But this movie was shown on cable before National Geographic's premiere airing of Titanic when it was discovered by Bob Ballard. Well, this is my favorite Titanic film anyway. No, it is really an average movie but I always connect to that Sunday night memory when I first witnessed Titanic underwater and before most people were aware of it. I was thirteen and with my new VCR. I taped and saved the movie and the Titanic special. The special effects were nothing special. Strong acting from Susan St. James, Cloris Leachman, and Helen Mirren with a very small role. Helen's May Sloane says to Thomas Andrews, the ship's builder, "there will be many questions?" That scene in the smoking lounge is also a poignant since she is the last to see the man who built her and die with her. In the last moments of the ship, men knelt in prayer. What I will always take from this film is the ending. An ending which signified the true meaning of the disaster. The end of the film takes place in the following Monday morning on the Carpathia with all the survivors and the silence. Watching Susan St. James with her male companion was riveting. They were two second class passengers who lost no loved one from the disaster. At the last scene, Mrs. Astor is greeted by a Carpathian passenger who offers "it was God's will. You must move on. Coffee?" Mrs. Astor replies "No coffee, no God either. God went down with the Titanic." That was the last line of the movie. The last shot is over the water and the chairs with Titanic floating. There are other pieces of Titanic debris. But the debris represented the people which is enough for most squeamish viewers. The last film of Titanic filmed before the discovery. No, it's not Cameron. But it's a resolution. Something missing in the Cameron version.

This film is an extremely atmospheric telling of the sinking of the Titanic. It used mainly real passengers to tell the story through, and as a result isn't too bad a production.

However, the special effects were terrible and inaccurate. Firstly, the film makers used the Queen Mary to film on as the Titanic - this ship looks totally different and is the same ship used for the Poseidon Adventure. In the long shots of the ship sinking, SOS Titanic simply colourised scenes from A Night to Remember. The scenes of the ship sinking were really hopeless - continuity was terrible and the water actually flowed down the deck TOWARD the submerged bow. This is the most important part in a Titanic story, so to handle it so sloppily really is unforgivable.

However, the scenes on board really captured the atmosphere of the times and the atmosphere of impending disaster to which all on board were fatally oblivious. The opening scenes as the Carpathia rescues survivors were really handled well (apart from Cpt. Rostron only organising the ship at the last minute - this wasn't true), and they conveyed a sense of numbed shock and loss. The characters are all real, which is a plus too.

All in all, this film does not impress in realistic special effects, nor in making the disaster look real; but it does well in telling a story and telling it with considerable atmosphere.

First of all, ANY Titanic film is going to be crushed by Cameron's version of this disaster! Not for its story line, but for its incredible attention to detail and its use of special effects. When this movie was made(1979)there was still so many mysteries about the sinking. Granted, the creativity is strained and the DVD version is hideously chopped and edited poorly, but the television version (I still have a tape of it from ABC when it aired again in 1981) is much clearer and the characters are not so 'rushed' through the plot. I do agree that Jansen did a sloppy job of playing Astor, though. Seemed like he always wanted to be somewhere else, however in the television version many of his scenes were redone and he sounds much better. This show marked my beginning with a fascination for the Titanic. I later met survivors in 1987 and for that, I love this movie. It's too bad the television version is not on DVD...it's much, much better.

Cameron's was nothing more than a teen aged frolic and a technical masterpiece, but as far as catching the effectiveness of the era and expectations and afterwards, he is far below this one.

No doubt, this movie is where my fascination with David Warner began, as his portrayal of Lawrence Beesley is a marvel to listen to. Cameron felt the romance with Leigh Goodwin (portrayed by Susan St. James, Goodwin was a real woman on the Titanic, but I don't know if she knew Beesley, but the romance was fictitious regardless) was cold and icy. I found it to be utterly delightful compared to Jack and Rose's juvenile romp in the motor car.

And unknown to Cameron, Bernard Fox (best known as Doctor Bombay in Bewitched) who played Col. Archibald Gracie in the '97 Titanic movie, was Lookout Frederick Fleet in A Night To Remember.

So Fox and Warner are two actors who have been in two Titanic movies. What intriguing names.

Leachman's Molly Brown is a twist compared to Kathy Bates forgettable '97 interpretation or even Marilu Henner's out-of-date '96 telemovie portrayal.

It is fun to compare the movies and persons shown. This one did focus on a few more, such as the Harrises and the Marvins, the Countess of Rothes, Emma Bucknell, a bit more steerage.

The '96 telemovie with George C. Scott as the captain is the only one to show the Allisons, altho it doesn't clearly say what that was all about with the nanny, Alice Cleaver.

Lawrence Beesley would jump to the lifeboat while still holding his night clothes, he wasn't wearing them. Fred Barrett would ask him why he had them, and he replied he had no idea.

This movie was rich, however, with the shoeshine lads, the sensational music, from the sauna (as someone else mentioned) to the mundane (but it was all they had) steerage music.

There is a much stronger feeling of Irish third class here than in any other Titanic movies, and we get a more overal feel of those in peril here, as compared to Cameron's version with only Rose in danger.

Wireless operator Harold Bride as well as chief wireless operator Wilde have never been decently shown in a movie. Night to Remember had David McCallum and the '96 movie showed them also, but the overturned lifeboat has only been observed in Night To Remember, and only if you have really read about it, do you realize that is what is happening here in S.O.S. Titanic.

Great fun in having to pinpoint the Strauses because Mrs. Straus would call her maid by her first name, Ellen, and I recalled from reading that Mrs. Straus' maid's name was Ellen Bird.

The only way the Strauses were shown in this movie.

Interesting also to note that in 1912, wives were listed under their husbands names, but maids were listed individually.

The biggest complaint about this movie is the wrong date shown, which I suppose is inexcusable for the subject matter.

Pearl Harbor wasn't attacked on December 9th, 1941.

Still this one is nowhere near the worst. That would have to be the 1931 version. The '53 Babs Stanwyck one is a bit wincing also.

And I'm not familiar with the Queen Mary, so its usage here is hardly a hindrance to me.

Helen Mirren's moment as the maid who converses with Thomas Andrews is inspired.

In watching this one as I type this, the silence throughout much of it is as effective, if not more, than Cameron's symphony orchestra.

Sadly, I am aware that what I have just ordered is indeed an edited copy.

The opening with the Carpathia is missing, with Ian Holm's chilling "my ship" as he describes the Titanic.

Also missing is the elderly woman leading the steerage in song.

And I fear the wonderful exchange between the shoe shine lads is cut also.

The sauna may also be missing.

And one post lists Charles Herbert Lightoller as the First Officer, another post says he was the second Officer.

Lightoller was the Second Officer, highest ranking surviving officer from the Titanic.