A Titanic struggle (II)
When they say Titanic is a disaster movie, they're not talking about the action on screen.... By Paul McDermott.
I have thought about it for some time and there is no easy way to say it. I have tried euphemisms and analogies, but all these pleasantries do is distract from the importance of the information. It is best to be brief and blunt, so please, do not be shocked at what I am about to say.
My message is simply this: empty your bladder before you see Titanic. Especially the very young or elderly. You may be offended by my brutality now, but you will thank me for it later.
I made this mistake of seeing the film on a full tank. I thought I had an unburstable bladder of steele. I thought I could defy this film.
When it ran for over three hours I was worried. But the duration of the film was not the real problem. The problem was the water. A digitally enhanced ocean in luminous 70-millimetre crashing all around me. Every time it lapped against the hull it called to its aquatic doppelganger, its discoloured sibling resting in my bladder, to come join it.
There is so much water in this film it deserves its own credit. When its not streaming through shattered cabin doors or bursting through stained glass, it's steaming windows, moistening cheeks, disguised as champagne or summoned as spit. Not a scene goes by without some poor relation of H2O making a guest appearance.
Every time the sea burst through a pipe, eddied in a stairwell or careered through the corridors, I understood the shallow meaning of water torture. When the captain sttod on the deck of his sinking ship and twin jets sprayed in arc across his chest, my bladder cried out in sympathy. It, like the waters of the Atlantic, neede to express its nature.
Even when there was no water in shot, I heard it about to enter like an over-eager actor, shuffling his feet outside the door. It burbled, sprinkled, dripped and announced its wetness without being seen. It was always there and it was always calling, calling, calling...
And as water forced its way into the body of the Titanic, it was trying to force its way out of mine.
I thought, I'll be damned if I let this rebel organ dictate my actions. Why should I let one part of my body defeat the others? If I leave, I'll lose the plot. I made a financial investment in this feature and a little internal pressure as not going to waste my hard-earned cash. I decided to grit my teeth, gird my loins, bear down and stay seated. I was going to brave it out! I crossed my legs, I hunched forward, I loosened my trousers. I settled back and relaxed (but I didn't relax too much).
I then noticed the entire cinema sat cross-legged, hunched forward and slightly distracted. With this awareness, my panic dissipated. I felt a connection, a unity with my straining comrades.
Seconds later I was also aware that I wouldn't be the only one heading to the toilet at the end of the film. My new comrades instantly became the enemy and I eyed them with contempt. Images flooded my mind of overcroded urinals and columns of misery stretching from each cubicle. I saw damp fathers pointing their exploding sons at the trough, rolls of wet toilet paper and so much acrid spray the lavetory became a steamroom.
I lost the battle with the bloat minutes before Titanic ended. I rushed out a street exit, knowing everyone else would be heading to the foyer. I found myself in a poorly lit uninhabited back alley. I opened the flood gates. Every muscle sighed with relief, even my mind seemed clearer.
Clear enough to realise that what I had taken as a back alley was, in fact, a major pedestrian thoroughfare.
Those members of the audience with stronger constituations then I were now using this handy walkway to get to their cars. Sadly, the sight of disgusted families was not enough to stem the tide. They scurried by, shielding the eyes of their children. I clamped down, but I couldn't stop. I was a liqyid blimp, a urine geyser, a four-litre wine cask being squeezed dry by the hand of God.
Hours passed, as did half the population of Sydney, before it slowed and finally stopped. I crept off into the night, noticing I was not the only one affected by the movie. The city was drenched.
The true magic of this epic will not be seen in the streams of people with satisfied faces leaving the cinema, but in the streams of people with satisfied faces behind the cinema. I suspect it's going
-Typed up by ktwong