ABSTRACT
James Cameron’s Titanic (1997) has become identified with two major indications of success: it is the highest-grossing film in history, and it tied for a record number of Academy Awards. In what follows, I examine issues of taste as they intersect with the Oscars’ cultural sanction, and how such intersections impact on blockbusters in general and on Titanic in particular. I argue that, despite the Oscars’ reluctance to reward blockbusters featuring the action genre, Titanic enjoyed great success at the Academy Awards by also appealing to middlebrow expectations. Though its overwhelming Oscar success is not without precedent, the timing of Titanic’s multiple victories represents Hollywood’s reassertion of legitimacy following the success of independent films in the mid-1990s. The fusion of Titanic’s spectacle with the Oscar ceremony for 1997 further demonstrates the film’s integral position in Hollywood at that time.
