James Cameron weighs in on debates he still has about 'Titanic' raft scene

James Cameron says he is done debating the ending of Titanic.

The filmmaker addressed the long-running question during a recent appearance on The Hollywood Reporter’s Awards Chatter podcast. Reflecting on the scene that showed Jack, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, sharing a floating raft with Rose, Cameron simply dismissed the topic bluntly.

“Don’t ask me about the f****** raft, people!” Cameron, 71, said when the topic came up.

As Cameron told listeners not to ask him about the raft anymore, he said the debate ignores both the intent of the scene and the science behind it.

“Look, we even went to the lengths of doing an experiment to see if Jack could have in any way survived, or if they could have both survived, and people didn’t even hear the answer when I told them the answer,” Cameron, who won three Oscars for the film, explained. 

“The answer is, if Jack somehow was an expert in hypothermia and somehow knew what science now knows back in 1912, it is theoretically possible, with a lot of luck, that he might have survived.”

“Therefore, the answer is no, he could not have. There’s no way. The conditions were not met. He couldn’t have known those things.”

Cameron urged that the ending was never meant to be ambiguous. He said Jack’s death was essential to the story and Rose’s arc, as changing that outcome would undermine the emotional core of the film.

The director’s comments come as his career continues to set records. Cameron is the only filmmaker to direct four movies that grossed more than $1 billion worldwide. Those films include Titanic and three installments of Avatar.