As the frozen lovers Rose and Jack clung to a bobbing slab of timber in the icy Atlantic waters during the final moments of “Titanic,” audience members believed their love should have gone on.

Jack’s body and legs dangled in the subzero waters below, as Rose rested atop a wooden door that had been flushed out of the doomed ocean liner. But was Jack’s chivalry in vain? Could Rose have made room for him on that slab of wood?

This week, Leonardo DiCaprio, who played the 20-year-old Jack in the 1997 drama, nearly waded into the debate, reigniting a controversy that has haunted the movie on internet forums for years and inspired recreations nearly as elaborate as the $280 million film itself.

In an interview with MTV News during the publicity tour for the Quentin Tarantino film “Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood,” Mr. DiCaprio sat with his arms folded and looked down at the ground shaking his head, when a reporter asked about it.