User talk:Cw3077.13

It's really quite odd. When Titanic first came out,the reviews were mixed but the public generally loved it,those who disliked the film were definitely in the minority. Over the years,it has became somewhat fashionable to slag Titanic off,even if a great many of those people who did so were probably amongst those who made it such an enormous hit in the cinemas. Titanic is flawed,definitely,sometimes greatly so. However,it's also a tremendous achievement for it's director James Cameron. Mixing a real disaster with romance is harder to do than some might think. Maybe he did have a right to say "I'm king of the world" when the film won Best Picture at the Oscars. Just once.

The modern day opening is excellent,making effective use of some of Cameron's real footage he took of the sunken Titanic. There is a real sense of mystery. Than we flash back to the Titanic being boarded,and the film stalls just a little for around two hours. The attention to detail is amazing {even all the cutlery matched,you know} and there is nothing wrong with an extremely slow build up to action-think of The Seven Samourai. However,the central romance between Leo and Kate is often badly written and unconvincing. For a start Kate's Rose would certainly not have done two things she does in the film as quickly as she did {Obviously thousands of teenage girls seeing the film in 1997 would disagree with my views}. We also have to suffer Cameron constantly labouring the point that the poor people on the ship are better than the rich people.

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However,the final 80 or so minutes,detailing the sinking,is simply brilliant film making. The suspense is built expertly,even though we know what will happen,and climaxes with some technical shots which are still impressive. Perhaps there is a little two much emphasis on the central couple,but there are some truly moving moments,and it really feels true,although of course Cameron did play with the facts a little here and there,as at least one descendant of one of the survivors has pointed out. The following sequence involving the boats is extremely haunting,with some especially good use of sound. As for the final scene,it does manage to be pretty moving,it's schmaltzy but it works {though hardly original,think of Somewhere In Time and various 40s romantic fantasies}.

Titanic has some excellent use of CGI {watch out for the transitions from present to the past on the sunken ship} and one glaringly bad special effect-the iceberg which looks like polystyrene. James Horner's best selling score is really quite poor and only occasionally brings the emotion it should do. Performances are generally excellent and sometimes succeed in overcoming some thin characterisation {such as Billy Zane as Rose's fiancée,who even has to suffer with far too much eye make up!} The RMS Titanic was a British registered four funnelled ocean liner built for the transatlantic passenger and mail service between Southampton and New York.

Constructed at the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast, Ireland Titanic was, on her maiden voyage, the largest vessel afloat.

On April 10th 1912 the Titanic sailed from Southampton with 2,200 passengers and crew, four days later the Titanic collided with an iceberg and sank. 1500 people died and 700 survived. This website attempts to tell their story and that of the great ship with which their fate would be inextricably linked.

It is 97 years, 10 months and 3 days since Titanic was lost.

Overall Titanic is still worth seeing,and sometimes it really does hit the heights that it should. It succeeds more than it fails,which is impressive in a film as ambitious as this.

Dr. Martin luther king Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was born on 15 January 1929 in his maternal grandparents' large Victorian house on Auburn Avenue in Atlanta, Georgia. He was the second of three children, and was first named Michael, after his father. Both changed their names to Martin when the boy was still young.

King's paternal grandfather, James Albert King, had been a sharecropper near the small town of Stockbridge, Georgia, outside Atlanta. Like most sharecroppers, he had worked hard and earned little. King, Sr. was the second of ten children. He had left Stockbridge for Atlanta at the age of sixteen, with nothing but a sixth-grade education and a pair of shoes.

In Atlanta he worked odd jobs and studied, and slowly developed a reputation as a preacher. While preaching at two small churches outside of Atlanta, he met Alberta Christine Williams, his future wife, and King, Jr.'s mother. She was a graduate of Atlanta's Spelman College, had attended the Hampton Institute in Virginia, and had returned to Atlanta to teach. Her father, the Reverend Adam Daniel Williams, presided over Atlanta's well-established Ebenezer Baptist Church.

When King, Sr. and Williams married, they moved into the Williams home on Auburn Avenue, the main street of Atlanta's African American business district. After some time had passed, her father asked King, Sr. to serve as assistant pastor at Ebenezer, which he did. When the senior pastor died of a heart attack in 1931, King, Sr. took over his duties.

King, Jr. and his siblings were born into a financially secure middle-class family, and thus they received better educations than the average child of their race; King's recognition of this undoubtedly influenced him in his decision to live a life of social protest, extending the opportunities he had enjoyed to all blacks. In his father, King had a model of courage: King, Sr. was involved in the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or NAACP, and had led a successful campaign to equalize the salaries of white and black teachers in Atlanta.

As a child, King's encounters with racial discrimination were mild but formative. The first significant one came when he began school. White playmates of his were to attend a different elementary school from his, and, once the year began, their parents no longer allowed King to come over and play. It was this instance of injustice that first led his mother to explain to him the history of slavery and segregation.

When King was in high school, he attended an oratory contest in Valdosta, Georgia, where he took second prize. His victory was soured, however, by the long bus ride back to Atlanta: the bus was segregated, and the black people had to stand so that the white people could sit.

Thus King grew up in a family that encouraged him to notice and respond to injustices. Later in life, his father and mother would always continue to support King's choices, though they were forced at times to witness the tragic consequences of those choices, including their son's premature death. King's wife, Coretta, was home in Atlanta, Georgia. She had not heard from her husband in two days. Finally, she felt she had to do something. Once before, King had been in "solitary." At that time, John F. Kennedy was running for President. He had called Coretta and told her he would try to help her husband. And the next day, King got out of jail.

Now, in April, 1963, Coretta called President Kennedy in Washington. The President was away, but she spoke to his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy. She told him she was afraid her husband was not safe. He told her he would do everything he could to help King.

Later, Coretta's phone rang. It was the President calling from Florida. He told her he would look into her husband's trouble right away.

Both the President and his brother called Birmingham. Soon King was allowed to call Coretta. He was also allowed a visit from his lawyer. Before long, he was out of jail.

King was out of danger — for now. But the truth was, he lived with danger almost all the time. His home had been bombed twice. He had gotten hundreds of calls and letters from people who said they would kill him. Leading the civil rights movement was a dangerous job. Why had King chosen it? Perhaps there was something in his early life that made it all happen.

MARTIN'S CHILDHOOD

Martin Luther King, Jr., was born in January 15, 1929, in Atlanta, Georgia. His father was the pastor of a Baptist church there. King, Sr., hated the South's segregation laws. These laws kept white and black people separated. African Americans were kept out of "white" schools, parks, theaters, hotels, and eating places. They had to sit in separate sections in trains and buses.

"I don't care how long I have to live with this system," King Sr., said. "I will never accept it." He was a fighter and his son, Martin, took after him.

One day, Martin was riding with his father in the family car. Mr. King drove past a "Stop" sign by accident. A policeman told him to pull over. Then he said, "All right, boy, let me see your license."

No man likes to be called a "boy." This was a way of insulting African-Americans in the South. Mr. King got very angry. He pointed to his son and said to the policeman:

"This is a boy. I'm a man. Until you call me one, I will not listen to you."

The policeman was so surprised, he wrote out the ticket in a hurry and left.

It was no wonder that Martin also grew up to hate segregation. The whole system, he thought, was unfair and stupid. Even more, he hated the violence that grew out of segregation. He had seen the Ku Klux Klan riding at night. It meant that an African-American would be beaten or killed for going against the system. These things almost made Martin turn against all white people.

SEEKING A CAREER

In school, Martin was a bright student and skipped two grades. He entered Morehouse College in Atlanta when he was only 15. At this time, Martin wasn't sure what he wanted to be. But he knew he wanted to help his people in some way. Religion, he felt, was "out of touch" with the real problems of his people — segregation and poverty. For a while, he thought he would become a lawyer.

But two of the leading teachers at Morehouse were ministers. And they showed him that a minister could care about things like segregation and hunger. Martin knew then that he wanted to be a minister. At 18, Martin became his father's assistant.

Martin graduated from Morehouse when he was 19. But he wanted to study even more. So he entered a school of religion in Pennsylvania. The school had 100 students. Only six were black. Now Martin set out to prove what his mother had always told him: "You are as good as anybody."

Martin studied hard and became an "A" student. What about his wish to help his people? He was beginning to find a way.

In college, Martin had read an essay by Henry David Thoreau. Thoreau was an American writer who lived more than 100 years ago. He believed that a man had the right to disobey any law he thought was evil or unjust. Once Thoreau did not pay his taxes as a protest against slavery. He was put in jail. A friend came to visit him.

"Why are you in jail?" the friend asked.

"Why are you out of jail?" he answered.

THOREAU AND GANDHI

King liked Thoreau's idea — that men should not obey evil or unjust laws. And he began to search harder for a way to fight against evil. He read books by the world's great thinkers and writers. Then one day, he heard a speech about the great leader of India, Mahatma Gandhi.

Gandhi had won freedom for his country from British rule (1947). And he had done it in a very unusual way. From the start, he told his people not to use violence against the British. He told them to resist the British by peaceful means only. They would march. They would sit down or lie down in the streets. They would strike. They would boycott (refuse to buy) British goods.

Gandhi had also read Thoreau's essay. He, too, believed that men had the right to disobey unjust laws. Like Thoreau, he believed that men should gladly go to jail when they break such laws.

"Fill the jails," Gandhi said. But — never use violence. Violence only brings about more hate and more violence. Gandhi told his people to meet body force with soul force. He told them to meet hate with love. Gandhi called this "war without violence." And it helped India gain its freedom.

KING ADOPTS NONVIOLENCE

Martin Luther King began to think that black Americans could use Gandhi's way to win their freedom. Wasn't Gandhi's way also the way of Jesus Christ? Hadn't Christ told his people to "turn the other cheek" if someone struck them?

This idea of fighting peacefully against evil was called nonviolence. Was it the coward's way? No, said King. It took more courage not to hit back when struck.

In the next few years, many good things happened to King. He graduated at the top of his class, with "A's" in all his subjects. He met and married Coretta Scott. And, in 1954, he got the job he really wanted. He became minister of a very good Baptist church in Montgomery, Alabama.

King's life was now busy and full. But he wanted to do more than care for the souls of his church members. He wanted his church to help young people to go to college. He wanted it to help black people to register and vote — a tough job in the South. Religion, King said, must care about heaven and earth, souls and slums.

The members of King's church liked his ideas. They soon put them into action. King saw his church grow day by day. Meanwhile, he was also studying for another degree. He would soon be Dr. King. These were probably the happiest months of his life.

TURNING POINT FOR KING

Then, on December 1, 1955, something happened in Montgomery that changed King's life. Within a few years, it would help change the lives of most black Americans, and the lives of many white Americans, too.

What happened in Montgomery that day? A black woman, Rosa Parks, was seated just behind the "white" section on a bus. (By law, whites sat up front, blacks in the back.) Mrs. Parks was going home from her job as a seamstress. When some white people got on the bus, there were no seats left in the "white" section. So the bus driver told Mrs. Parks, and three other African-Americans, to move to the back of the bus. The bus was now full, and Mrs. Parks would have to stand. The three other African-Americans obeyed the driver. But Mrs. Parks said she would not give up her seat.

Why was this so unusual? When Mrs. Parks said "no" to the bus driver, she was breaking the law. She was arrested on the spot.

The news of her arrest spread like wildfire among Montgomery's black people.

Until now, they had not challenged the anti-black laws in Montgomery. It was dangerous, and it seemed hopeless. But now they were angry and ready to act.

The next night, there was a meeting of Montgomery's black leaders. It took place in Martin Luther King's church. The leaders agreed to call a one-day boycott of the buses as a protest.

THE BUS BOYCOTT BEGINS

The next day, leaflets were handed out among the town's African Americans. The leaflets asked them not to ride the buses on Monday.

Sunday night, King began to worry. Would the boycott work? Would the people have the courage to protest? King wasn't sure.

The next morning, King got his answer. From his window, he could see a bus stop. The first bus was empty! So was the second. The third bus had just two white riders. It was the same story all over town. Black people were not riding the buses. They were walking, taking cabs, or driving their cars to work. Some were riding on mules or on wagons pulled by horses. "A miracle has taken place," King said.

That afternoon, black leaders formed an organization to head the protest movement. Before King could say "no," they elected him president of the organization. King felt he needed more time for his church work. But it was too late to turn down this job. So King became a civil rights leader.

That night, there was a meeting of Montgomery African Americans. Thousands came. They heard speeches by King and other black leaders. Then they voted to keep up the boycott until:

1. Bus drivers treated black riders politely.

2. Black riders would not have to give up their seats to whites.

3. Some black bus drivers were hired.

That day, King said, was Montgomery's moment in history. The black people there had started a movement that would bring new hope to black people everywhere.

The bus boycott was supposed to last one day. Yet it lasted more than a year. Why?

WHITES FIGHT BACK

At first, most African-Americans rode to work in cabs owned by Negro taxi companies. These cabs charged them only 10 cents a ride — the same as the buses. But the police told the taxi companies they had to charge at least 45 cents a ride. That was the law.