Raise the Titanic
Short description
Raise the Titanic concerns a secret mission to recover a rare mineral from the wreck of the Titanic. A new American defence system depends on a supply of the mineral, and the only known quantities large enough to matter went down with the ship in 1912. An American team, led by Admiral James Sandecker and including the adventurer Dirk Pitt and the scientist Gene Seagram, sets out to raise the liner from deep in the North Atlantic. Their work is complicated by Soviet interest in the same cargo, turning the salvage operation into a contest between the two powers.
The film was directed by Jerry Jameson, whose earlier credits include Hurricane and Airport '77, and it followed in 1980, before Starflight: The Plane That Couldn't Land and Cowboy. Adam Kennedy wrote the screenplay, from Clive Cussler's novel, and Lew Grade and William Frye produced. Jason Robards plays Sandecker, with Richard Jordan as Pitt, David Selby, Anne Archer, Alec Guinness and Bo Brundin among a credited cast of 26.
Made in the United Kingdom by ITC Entertainment, the film cost about 36 million dollars and returned roughly 7 million worldwide, a poor result against its budget. On IMDb it holds 5.2 out of 10 from around 6,100 votes, and on TMDB 5.4 out of 10 from about 120 votes, with a film critics' rating of 5.2 out of 10 from eight reviews, so audiences and critics alike placed it in modest territory.
What's left behind the scenes
- The 'Titanic' model was built for $350,000. When it turned out to be too large for the water tank where filming was planned, a larger tank had to be built, costing an additional $6 million.
- Initially, Stanley Kramer was the director of the film, but he left the project after two weeks of shooting due to creative differences. He was replaced by Jerry Jameson, who had previously directed the disaster film 'Airport '77' starring Jack Lemmon.
- Clive Cussler, who wrote the novel on which the film was based, played a cameo role as a reporter attending a press conference.
- The lead role was offered to Steve McQueen, but he turned it down as he found the script too "flat".
- The film was nominated for three Golden Raspberry Awards, awarded for the worst achievements in cinema.
- The film is based on the 1976 novel of the same name by popular American writer and underwater explorer Clive Cussler, which was the third book in the Dirk Pitt adventure series.
- The author of the original literary work was so disappointed with the resulting adaptation that he categorically refused to sell the rights to his other novels in the series for many years. Only more than twenty years later, after much hesitation, did he agree to the adaptation of "Sahara" (2005) and was horrified by the result once again, which then flopped at the box office.
- The plot of both the book and the film is entirely based on the long-held belief that the enormous "Titanic" sank whole, without breaking apart. It was only in 1985, nine years after the book's release and five years after the film's premiere, that Robert Ballard's underwater expedition found the wreckage of the famous liner, discovering that it had broken into two parts and numerous smaller debris scattered across the ocean floor. Almost all films about the "Titanic" disaster released since then show it splitting in two before sinking.
- The model of the 'Titanic' built for filming was exhibited in Malta for many years, but sustained severe, irreparable damage during a violent storm in 2003.
Similar movies
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