A necklace.  That’s all they’re looking for in this expedition. Three years of work, and nothing yet of value to bring back to dry land. Well that’s all about to change…

Many years after The Titanic sank, an expedition set out to retrieve the Heart of the Ocean, a necklace that was on the ship  in the custody of one Caldon “Cal” Hockley to be given to his fiancé Rose DeWitt Bukater. As the team searches the wreckage beneath the sea, they come across a safe buried in the rubble of one of the first-class rooms. The team surrounds the chest. prying it open only to find a portfolio filled with a drawing of a woman wearing the necklace engraved with the date of April 14, 1912.

The team broadcasts the photo to the media, and receives one call, a call from a Titanic survivor named Rose, who says that she is the woman in the photo is her and that she knows of the necklace. The excavating team doesn’t buy it, but allows her to come aboard the search ship to tell her story.

Thus, Rose’s story is the heart of a movie that includes drama, dysfuntional relationships, and lots and lots of suspense and action as the great ship slowly sinks into the sea, taking all of her glory and her passengers with it. The movie creates a realistic understanding of how many lives were cut short in that one tragic evening and gives us an understanding of what it was like for many victims who had to face the reality that very few of them would survive. Families are torn apart, as women and children fill the life boats, while the band plays on amidst the panic and chaos on all of the decks.

James Cameron recreates for the audience a real-life experience of that fateful voyage, leaving subtle hints as to how the present was formed by the past, as well as including actual film footage of the wreckage captured by the diver/director himself.  The 3-D experience intensifies the effect of “being there.”

For those who were fans the first time, you will find yourself predicitng the upcomeing scenes or and lip-synching the lines. For those who missed this movie the first time around, you will want to live the experience more than once.