 It is an account of the casualness and flippancy of most of the people right after the great ship has struck (even though an ominous cascade of water is pouring into her bowels); of the slow accumulation of panic that finally mounts to a human holocaust, of shockingly ugly bits of baseness and of wonderfully brave and noble deeds.The film won numerous awards, including a Golden Globe Award for Best English-Language Foreign Film and received high praise from reviewers on both sides of the Atlantic.The film was at best only a modest commercial success due to its original huge budget and a relatively poor impact in America.