'Revolutionary Road' vs. 'Titanic'

About a week ago I saw Revolutionary Road with Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet in theaters. It is essentially about a woman who is not content with the social norms and constraints placed on her in the time in which she lives. She spends the movie searching for ways to break free of these restraints and in the end comes to a tragic fate.

Well, coincidentally, Big Monkey and I ended up catching some of Titanic with Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet on Saturday morning on our trip this weekend. If you remember, that movie is about a woman who is not content with the social norms and constraints placed on her in the time in which she lives. She spends the movie searching for ways to break free of these restraints and in the end comes to a tragic fate.

Sound familiar!?

Ok, ok, I know the two are not exactly the same... one is a budding love story while the other is a love story gone horribly wrong, but I did find it so interesting that the Kate Winslet character is essentially the same character in both movies. She is a woman who wants more. She wants more than to be a wife to her husband. She wants to travel, live life to the fullest and "make it (i.e. life) count", just as Jack's toast to a table of aristocrats advises in Titanic. She wants love to sweep her off her feet, not to insist she settle because it is the responsible thing to do. There are really so many similarities between Rose and April that it could not have gone unnoticed to Winslet when picking the part.

I think one of the worst things that could happen to a person is to live a life so unfulfilled and without purpose.