I saw it in theaters when it first came out and also in 2012.
I've seen A Night To Remember. I felt like it was a good historical representation but I have to admit I'm all about the Romeo and Juliet of Jack and Rose.
While what happened was of course sad I love history and have a "morbid curiosity" for things like this.
One fact that pisses me off is that Ismay was so "distraught" they gave him a sedative on the Carpathia.
Wouldn't those poor people that just lost their loved ones due to him wanting to make headlines deserve a sedative.
It’s difficult to say how I would react in a situation like the sinking. I would like to think that I would be more like a Thomas Andrews than a Bruce Ismay. However, there are witnesses who say Ismay was on deck helping passengers into life boats trying to get as many people as possible off the ship. Ismay did leave in one of the last life boats launched and there were no women and children around the life boat when he left. It was already being lowered when he and another passenger jumped into it. It was a risky choice. He could have missed and fallen into the ocean. He did suffer from depression for the remainder of his life, so he may have had mental health issues prior to the sinking as well. My understanding is that he was sedated to prevent him being a danger to himself so he would be able to be interviewed by investigators, not for his own comfort. Of course, the longer people study the events of that night, the more details are uncovered, and that is a good thing in my opinion.
Ultimately, even if he wanted the ship to go faster it was up to Captain Smith to make that decision. Considering that he was retiring after the maiden voyage of Titanic, he would not have had much to lose by defying Ismay if such a request was made. I am not sure it was. I personally believe it was a comment in passing more along the lines of “Wouldn’t it be great if we could get into NY early?” as opposed to “I want you to get into NY by X time, no matter what.” The captain was the one who had the power to make that type of decision, no one else.
In my opinion there were many people who could in some small way shoulder a portion of the blame for what happened. So many little things went wrong, culminating in the sinking of the ship, like missing binoculars for the lookouts or wireless messages about ice that didn’t make it to the bridge because the wireless room was backed up with outgoing messages. I don’t think Ismay is the villain many of the Titanic films have made him out to be, although I do think as the owner of the ship he should have listened when the builders proposed having life boat space for every passenger (although there is debate as to whether there was enough time to launch that many boats). The shipbuilders weren’t innocent either though, for example, they could have built true watertight compartments to contain the damage. If Thomas Andrews had survived, would he have been vilified like Ismay for being alive when so many others had died?
Yes, the other passengers deserved something to deal with the shock of their losses. I have often wondered how many of the rescued passengers had a decent quantity of liquid courage once on board the Carpathia. . .