``TITANIC'' SINKS BY COMPARISON.

Byline: James Bemis Commentary

R.M.S. Titanic sailed into Ventura County recently, packaged in a black cardboard hull emblazoned with shimmering, idealized portraits of the film's stars, Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet. ``Titanic'' 's entry was welcomed at area video outlets by teen-age girls (including one at my house), many waiting for hours at local ports of entry for its arrival. No ocean cruiser ever arrived to a warmer reception.

As Hollywood's all-time box office smash and winner of a record-tying 11 Oscars, ``Titanic'' arrived more heavily decorated than such classics as ``Citizen Kane,'' ``The Wizard of Oz'' or ``Casablanca.'' Does it live up to the hype?

Unfortunately, no. Not only isn't the new ``Titanic'' one of the all-time greatest movies, it's not even the best film about the Titanic tragedy.

Three features have been made about the tragedy: ``Titanic'' in 1953, ``A Night to Remember'' in 1958 and the recent blockbuster. Interestingly, each depicts the disaster from a different perspective, revealing a great deal about the cultural assumptions of the time.

In the 1953 Hollywood-produced film, Clifton Webb and Barbara Stanwyck play a dysfunctional married couple, as Webb discovers that his young son, who idolizes him, is illegitimate. Webb's estrangement from his family ends when his son courageously gives up his lifeboat seat with his mother and sister to find his father on the sinking liner.

The drama ends with the two, along with the other doomed passengers, singing ``Nearer My God to Thee'' as the ship goes under.

A sense of heroic chivalry permeates the film. This is perhaps the greatest - and least commented upon - aspect of the Titanic tragedy. According to the survivors, few men tried to escape their fate by breaking their cultural code to evacuate women and children first. Try imagining today's self-absorbed male doing the same.

The 1958 British production, ``A Night to Remember'' starring Kenneth More, portrays the Titanic as a supreme technological achievement and has an intriguing subplot featuring one of the ship's designers, Thomas Andrews, trying desperately to save the ruptured ship. Andrews goes down with his ship, but More's character, through nautical and scientific know-how, survives, saving the lives of many others, too.

In keeping with that era's growing faith in science (the space race was just beginning), ``A Night to Remember'' - by far the best of the three films - focuses on man's attempts to harness and overcome nature's awesome forces.

James Cameron's 1997 drama bypasses the heroism of the 1953 movie and the man-vs.-nature approach of the 1958 film in favor of ``progressive'' themes of class struggle and feminism. Here, the tragedy serves merely as a backdrop for the film's ``enlightened'' characters to find themselves and each other, defeating the regressive forces of money and status (in his case) and sexism (in hers).

While the real ship sank to the Atlantic's bottom, Hollywood's ``Titanic'' provides safe passage for modern myth-making. Beneath its attractive surface, the film's murky modern message, like an underwater shark, runs fast and deep.

The wealthy, consistent with Hollywood stereotype, are uniformly crass and self-indulgent, while those in steerage are warm and friendly. The rich heel, played by Billy Zane, is nearly campy; all he lacks is a handlebar moustache.

On this voyage, women find fulfillment by rejecting traditional roles of femininity and marriage, and indulge themselves in spitting, profanity and (what else?) premarital sex. Conforming to the new ethos, no consequences arise from their self-indulgence.

In reality, of course, people in 1912 who behaved like our very '90s characters would have found themselves jailed, pregnant or thrashed to within an inch of their lives; outcomes which, cynics might say, are exactly what these two deserve.

I explained all this to my teen-age daughter, pointing out that the older Titanic films were superior in terms of story, characterization, acting and dialogue. ``But, Dad,'' she replied triumphantly, ``they don't have Leonardo.''

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PHOTO (Ran in Conejo Edition only) ``Titanic'' is a big hit at local video stores, thanks to Leonardo DiCaprio's many fans.