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Bruce Hall: [Spoiler alert - if you're one of the two people who have never seen Titanic] I am a sucker for period films, so I'll sit through Titanic ten times before I sit through FernGully 2: Blue Boogaloo again. It would be easy for me to say that Avatar represents the greater technical achievement because...well...duh. But I am more impressed with the fact that for all the CGI that was necessary to pull off Titanic, you never really notice it - unless you're one of those people who insists you can see it because you already know it's there. The love story behind Titanic was silly. And I can't get over how Rose apparently married another man, had a big, loving family with him but never told any of them she was TOTALLY in love with someone else all these years.

But Titanic was a movie that made people (girls) want to see (drag their boyfriends to) it again and again, and it became a true cultural phenomenon. And, it's hard not to feel something at the end when the boat hits the thing and the thing happens - but I won't spoil it for you.

Oh! And, and by the way - she had the damn rock on her the whole time. Lied to her family for generations and then SAT there telling that stupid story, watching those scientists spend millions of dollars risking their lives to go down to the wreck looking for something she had IN HER PURSE WHOLE TIME. No, don't leave it for your family - that you LIED to for your whole life. Just throw it over board, all weepy and sentimental - because you love some street urchin you banged down in steerage more than you love your own family. You suck, Rose.

Felix Quinonez: Can I say a draw? I first picked Titanic because, well...damn. That movie opened pretty small and then just kept going. I can't think of any movie that had better legs and yes the ticket prices were cheaper.

But Avatar, like Titanic, had a lot of people who thought it was going to flop. It opened to a bigger opening weekend number but at $77 million, it wasn't even the biggest opening weekend of December. Its opening weekend number was big but it was by no means any indication that it was going to dethrone Titanic. And yes, its legs weren't as good as Titanic's. But Avatar opened to a much bigger theater count. Because of this more people could go see it right away then when they saw Titanic. I also think movie going habits have changed drastically. A lot more people are rushing out to see movies as quickly as possible. Did they even do midnight screenings in 1997? Not only that but did Titanic's performance really change the industry? Avatar, on the other hand started this whole 3D craze and I would argue that it even helped make movies like Clash of the Titans and Alice in Wonderland into much bigger hits than they would have been if not for Avatar.

Sooo, I have to say a tie or that they are both so insanely impressive that it doesn't even matter which is more impressive.

Kim Hollis: My answer is going to be Titanic, both financially and technically. As everyone else has mentioned, its longevity in theaters is just unbelievable. I actually did not see it in movie theaters until it hit the dollar theater, and I believe that was sometime in August of 1998. That was *nine months* after it initially debuted. I accept that movie-going habits have changed these days, but it's just a stunning accomplishment. Let us also remember that it held the record for top spot at the box office for more than a decade. I can't imagine that Avatar will do the same (though I don't rule anything out).

As far as the technical accomplishments, I would argue that bringing a true story as epic in scope as Titanic is a far bigger challenge than a fantasy, where you're creating your own world with its own rules. I had read some history of the Titanic prior to seeing the film, and I was always impressed by the film's overall accuracy. Yes, there are liberties here and there, but when it comes to the actual sinking of the boat, it happens exactly as books describe the events. There are a lot of little marvelous touches, too (I will always believe that Victor Garber's character fixing the clock as the boat is near to fully sinking is one of the finest moments in movie history). I admit to being someone who was jaded about Titanic in the few years after its release, but I've come around to really finding it to be an outstanding film that truly represents everything that is grand about Hollywood.

David Mumpower: This is one of the trickiest topics we've ever had on MMQB. I have vacillated on the subject many times. In terms of overall achievement, Titanic wins because of those 11 Academy Awards. With regards to technical achievement, Avatar requires the creation of an entire world that stimulates the senses in historically unprecedented fashion. Titanic mines the depths of the ocean floor to uncover long lost mysteries about a fatal journey. Each is dazzling. From a financial perspective, Avatar is more noteworthy due to the fact that nobody ever does this well with two different projects. George Lucas is a distant second in the discussion. Nobody else is even close. But I do not view this question as determined by box office. Instead, it is about pure technical achievement. In modern cinema, we can create virtual worlds that come to life onscreen. Yes, Cameron did this better than anyone else. It's not that novel, though. Titanic, on the other hand, is almost impossible to duplicate. The underwater exploration phase alone sets it apart. Avatar is a movie that Cameron couldn't do until the technology caught up to his vision. Titanic is a movie that nobody else could do because the wreckage alone is impenetrable to any other filmmaker in the industry. Someone can make another Avatar at some point. The same is not true of Titanic.

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