Tag: Jaws

Da-Dum, Da-Dum, Da-Dum…

June 20, 1975, was not only the opening of this movie but it turned into a huge pop culture event of the 1970s. It’s a movie known around the world. There were T-shirts, novelty songs, and hype…but the movie lived up to it and then some. 

Why was it so great? For me, I would say that Spielberg kept it simple. Jaws is based on the 1974 novel by Peter Benchley, which was inspired by a series of shark attacks off the coast of New Jersey in 1916. Benchley’s book tells the story of a great white shark terrorizing a small coastal town, and the efforts of three men to hunt it down. 

The acting in this was excellent to me. The one that I always pick out is Robert Shaw as the character Quint. He makes himself known quickly by the fingernails down the chalkboard tactic. Shaw made that character real to me. My favorite scene was him telling the story of delivering the atomic bomb, the sinking of the USS Indianapolis, and the shark attacks that happened. His performance is probably the main reason for Jaws being one of my favorite films of all time. The speech is based on a real event. The USS Indianapolis sank in 1945, resulting in the greatest loss of life due to shark attacks in history.

Spielberg wanted Lee Marvin for Quint and Jon Voight for Hooper. Spielberg got it right for this film. Roy Scheider as Martin and newcomer Richard Dreyfuss as Matt Hooper were great. It’s the realism that Shaw added that pushed this over. 

Spielberg’s use of tension, combined with John Williams’ score proved that a horror thriller could achieve both critical and commercial success. The film won three Academy Awards (for editing, score, and sound) and remains highly regarded by critics. But perhaps its greatest legacy is even today, many people feel some fear whenever they step into the ocean.

John Williams…The man is renowned for his film scores. Along with Jaws and barely scratching the surface…he also did Star Wars, Indiana Jones, E.T., Harry Potter, and Jurassic Park, just to name a few. 

The movies Duel and Jaws were Spielberg’s first two big movies. They share a common thread. Duel features a large diesel truck that is much like Jaws on dry land. Both movies work well. 

PLOT

It’s a hot summer on Amity Island, a small community whose primary business is its beaches. When new Sheriff Martin Brody discovers the remains of a shark attack victim, his first inclination is to close the beaches to swimmers. It doesn’t sit well with Mayor Larry Vaughn and several local business people. Brody backs down to his regret of that weekend. A predator kills a young boy. The dead boy’s mother puts out a bounty on the shark, and Amity is soon swamped with amateur hunters and fishermen hoping to cash in on the reward. A local fisherman with much experience hunting sharks, Quint, offers to hunt down the creature for a hefty fee. Soon, Quint, Brody, and Matt Hooper from the Oceanographic Institute are hunting the Great White shark at sea. As Brody succinctly surmises after their first encounter with the creature, they will need a bigger boat.

QUOTES

• Quint: [Quint first scratches the chalk board to get everyone’s attention] Y’all know me. Know how I earn a livin’. I’ll catch this bird for you, but it ain’t gonna be easy. Bad fish. Not like going down the pond chasin’ bluegills and tommycods. This shark, swallow you whole. Little shakin’, little tenderizin’, an’ down you go. And we gotta do it quick, that’ll bring back your tourists, put all your businesses on a payin’ basis. But it’s not gonna be pleasant. I value my neck a lot more than three thousand bucks, chief. I’ll find him for three, but I’ll catch him, and kill him, for ten. But you’ve gotta make up your minds. If you want to stay alive, then ante up. If you want to play it cheap, be on welfare the whole winter. I don’t want no volunteers, I don’t want no mates, there’s just too many captains on this island. $10,000 for me by myself. For that you get the head, the tail, the whole damn thing.

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• Ellen Brody: Martin hates boats. Martin hates water. Martin… Martin sits in his car when we go on the ferry to the mainland. I guess it’s a childhood thing. It’s a… there’s a clinical name for it isn’t there?
• Brody: Drowning.

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• Brody: You’re gonna need a bigger boat.

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