Titanic Is The Best Possible Defense Of The Movie Sex Scene

(To celebrate "Titanic" and its impending 25th-anniversary re-release, we've put together a week of explorations, inquires, and deep dives into James Cameron's box office-smashing disaster epic.

There are a handful of subjects in Film Discourse™ circles that seemingly never seem to go away, much to the chagrin of most. Of course, there's the endless debate regarding the validity of superhero blockbusters, whether or not "elevated horror" is a real thing, and a subject that wakes me up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat — whether or not there should be sex scenes in films.

First things first, as pointed out by Kate Hagen of The Black List, only 103 feature films were tagged on IMDb as featuring a sex scene of the 18,678 releases of 2022, meaning less than 1% of films last year included a sex scene. The idea that there is "too much sex" in cinema is not supported by data and is nothing more than conservative, fear-mongering talking points whipping people up into a moral panic. I refuse to waste my time arguing with the apparent pro-Hays Code weirdos out there who think sex scenes serve no narrative purpose, because the film "Titanic" exists, and is arguably the strongest defense in favor of cinematic sex scenes.

"Titanic" is a tragic epic about loss, wealth inequality, disaster, and death, but also a story of finding love under impossible circumstances. Jack and Rose's relationship starts on that fated ship and the impact takes 84 years to fully unravel. The film's success completely hinges on the audience's investment in Rose and Jack's story, which is intrinsically connected to witnessing their most private moments.

Folks have been debating for decades whether or not Rose could have made room for Jack to fit on the door, but another point hotly contested is Rose's virginal status. "Titanic" takes place in 1912, a time when, according to Marshall Cavendish's "Sex and Society," 61% of men admitted to having premarital sex compared to only 12% of women. However, the film intentionally leaves Rose's virginal status vague.

When Rose is gifted the Heart of the Ocean necklace, her 30-year-old fiancé Cal Hockley (Billy Zane) says, "There's nothing I'd deny you ... if you'd not deny me." This line makes it sound like Rose has not yet had sex with him, and he's hoping to bribe her with a massive jewel to have sex before marriage. I've always believed Rose to be a virgin and Cal is rightfully an a-hole for trying to bribe his betrothed teen bride-to-be to f**k him (among other reasons). I've heard folks describe his character as "cartoonishly villainous," which tells me they've never experienced an abusive, entitled man like Cal. Lucky them.

During breakfast, he reprimands her for attending a third-class party with Jack instead of screwing him. "I had hoped you would come to me last night," he tells her. "I was tired," she responds. He's exerting his controlling behavior, yelling at her and demolishing the fine dishes on the table in a rage for her not behaving as expected. She is his "wife in practice if not yet by law" and tells her she must "honor [him] the way a wife is required to honor a husband." This certainly sounds like he's referring to a lack of submission and sex. Rose understands the power and societal importance of her own virginity, so her decision to take autonomous control cannot be ignored.

When 101-year-old Rose is detailing her story to Brock Lovett and his crew, she describes her feelings about going on the trip with Cal as "screaming inside." When she finally formally meets Jack, it's because he sees her attempting to jump off the RMS Titanic. Rose would rather die than have to marry Cal and sign up for an eternity of living among the elite society of Philadelphia. The following day, Rose is shown Jack's sketchbook, which is filled with beautifully drawn images of women in various forms. A mother breastfeeding, a lonely woman donning every piece of jewelry she owns, and a one-legged sex worker are among the subjects in Jack's book. She isn't repulsed by his drawings but instead impressed by his ability to capture a woman's honesty.

It's important to remember that while premarital sex was considered taboo for women (let's be real, our puritanical culture often still feels that way), it was not uncommon for people to have sex out of wedlock, whether with hired workers or mistresses. Rose even points out the men who are dining with mistresses to Jack before dinner with the wealthy elite. She's fully aware of Jack's potential sexual exploits, but that does not scare her. If anything, it entices her to meet someone with such a progressive view on living that doesn't come with the caveat that his sexual expression must be lied about in order to save face in front of polite society. After all, she is admittedly a reader of Sigmund Freud, believing the size of the Titanic to be a symbol of the overcompensation of insecure men. Rose may not have experienced sex, but she's very aware of the way it functions in society.

When Rose finally bucks her generational obligations of marrying for money and not for love, she does so in a very big way. The kiss she and Jack share at the bow of the ship lights the spark, but the flame begins to roar when she tells Jack, "The last thing I need is another picture of me looking like a porcelain doll," implying that she wants to be captured in her most honest form — nude. Old Rose says, "My heart was pounding the whole time. It was the most erotic moment of my life. Up until then, at least." If we needed any certainty that Rose was a virgin, this surely solidifies it.

The drawing scene is absolutely magnificent. They laugh together, Rose mocks Jack for blushing, and he is a bundle of nerves. He is clearly falling for Rose and seeing her naked for the first time is not the same as seeing the nude women he's hired in the past. According to James Cameron (via Far Out Magazine), "You know what it means for her, the freedom she must be feeling. It's kind of exhilarating for that reason." Years later during an interview with Stephen Colbert on "The Late Show," Winslet admitted that it was hard to keep a straight face during the scene and that she felt compelled to laugh through it. That nervous energy adds to the scene's authenticity, and it's hard not to fall in love with their love.

The scene has since been parodied to death, but upon rewatch, the chemistry between Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio is palpable. If you google the word "intimacy," this moment could serve as the definition.

When the lovebirds seek solace in the Renault Type CB Coupe de Ville while trying to evade Cal's hired narc, the newly extricated Rose determines this to be the moment she has sex with Jack. She initiates the entire situation, pulling him out of the driver's seat and into the back with her. She brings his hand to her mouth, gently kissing his fingertips. "Put your hands on me, Jack" she commands, guiding his hand to her breast. As this is a PG-13 film, the camera cuts away to a shot of the ship, returning to the iconic sight of Rose's clenched hand slapping against a fogged-up window, a sign to the viewer that Rose has had what is presumably her first orgasm.

When the camera reenters the car, Jack and Rose are huddled face to face and soaking wet, a painful foreshadowing of how the two will spend their final moments together. "You're trembling," she observes. "Don't worry, I'll be alright," Jack assures her. Rose kisses Jack's forehead, caressing him to her chest. Rose is in complete control of the situation, and for the very first time, her life. The point is further enforced by the reveal that Rose left the nude drawing in the safe she shares with Cal.

"Darling, now you can keep us both locked up in your safe," she writes on a note with the drawing, the 1912 equivalent of texting your ex a selfie of you and your new beau. "I'd rather be his whore than your wife," she later tells Cal as she spits in his face. Rose is done with him, done with her life of opulence, done with the neglectful attitude of her wealthy mother, and ready to literally risk it all to be with Jack.

While there are certainly more explicit sex scenes in cinema, they're typically not found in films that are tied for winning the most Academy Awards. "Titanic" is a historical disaster epic, but one that is so deeply interwoven with a tale of sexual liberation that to remove it would be to fundamentally gut the heart of James Cameron's message. Due to the film's immense popularity, Rose is often cited by many millennials as the first vision of a nude woman they ever saw on screen and the sex scene between her and Jack was a many of a generation's introduction to the concept long before their parents gave them a talk about the birds and the bees. 

An unfortunate reality is that only 38% of high schools and 14% of middle schools across the United States teach all 19 topics identified as critical for sex education by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (via Harvard). There is obviously no data to support my theory, but if my experiences as a 7-year-old in 1997 are any indicator — that scene forced a hell of a lot of parents to explain to their children what sex was, and for that, we should all be grateful. I am fortunate to have been raised by parents that never stigmatized sex or nudity, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't think about Kate Winslet every time I drop my robe in front of my wife, hoping to capture a fraction of her confidence before she posed for Jack. And I'll admit, the best sex of my life has been the sex where I'm the most like Rose — in complete control of my desire.

James Cameron was pretty brilliant in framing "Titanic" as a story told from the memory of the 101-year-old Rose. By telling the story from her point of view, it forces the disconnected younger generations to relate to the very real humans lost in the devastating sinking of the unsinkable ship. When Rose first arrives on the Akademik Mstislav Keldysh research vessel, Lewis Bodine is thrilled to show her his digital reenactment of how the ship sank. He's utterly clueless about the fact that he's mansplaining a tragedy to a woman who experienced it firsthand. Sure, he knows the facts and logistics better than most, but what does he truly know of the very real people who lived and died?

The research team is enraptured by Rose's story, not because of her description of all of the egotistical ways in which humans failed the passengers of the RMS Titanic, but the human element of her journey. The team of researchers are so fixated on finding that damn necklace, that they never stopped to think about the people who wore it and what else they could have possibly lost. She forces the team to have empathy for the deceased, teaching them to assess the tragedy from more than just an intellectual perspective.

Rose's story is so much more than just hearing from Thomas Andrews that the ship lacked adequate lifeboats or that she's kept The Heart of the Ocean necklace the whole time. It's why the group is captivated by her confessions of posing nude and having illicit sex with a commoner to the point of tears. It's not because they're all perverted weirdos — it's because sex, desire, and love make Rose's experience undeniably human.