Jaws (1975)
Steven Spielberg
Main actors
Roy Scheider as Martin Brody
Richard Dreyfuss as Matt Hooper
Robert Shaw as Quint
Murray Hamilton as mayor Vaughn
Lorraine Gary as Ellen Brody
Jaws 10/10
Jaws. For a film that is over 40 years old, it's amazing to me how popular this movie is to this day. I can't think of anyone I know who didn't rush out of the pool at night with an impossible fears of a monster white shark patrolling the chlorinated freshwater just below them.
Jaws takes place on a fictional island, Amity, in an area off the coast of New England. The movie begins at what appears to be sunset on a beach where a bunch of college kids are smoking and drinking. We see two eyes meet from across the fire and one of the college girls, Chrissy, makes the first move on a clearly inebriated college guy. They skip the basic hellos and move quickly down the beach to the water, removing clothing as they go. The young man, who clearly cannot handle his liquor, falls behind as the girl enters the water alone. She swims out to a channel marker and, in one of the most terrifying opening scenes of all time, is dragged under by an unseen attacker while Captain lightweight passes out on the beach.
The next morning we meet Chief Martin Brody,
Scheider, and his wife Ellen, Lorraine Gary. We quickly find out that in Amity you say Yad instead of yard and one of the two children apparently was attacked by a vampire(rusty swingset.) Cup Thief Brody gets a call and rushes to the station where he meets the young man from the night before,who has reported a missing person. As they make small talk they stumble upon the severed arm,crawling in crabs and marinating in seaweed, of skinny dipper Chrissy.
The chief gets the opinion from a medical inspector that it was a shark attack and rushes to close the beaches.
Enter money hungry, doesn't listen to anything, hideous suit-wearing, mayor Vaughn (Murray Hamilton). He convinces the chief, who clearly is easily manipulated, that it was a boat and not a shark that killed the girl, and the beaches should stay open. We find our main character getting pestered at the beach whilst staying as far away from the water, which he apparently is scared of, despite living on an island. In this short scene we see an elderly gentleman with saggy man breasts, a lovely dog who clearly becomes victim of said shark, and a young boy who most likely regretted talking his mother into allowing him to go out in the water one last time. The young boy is quickly devoured by the silhouette of the monstrous shark and the chief realizes that it probably wasn't a boat this time. ( duh).
There is a wonderful scene that, in my opinion, was absolutely terrifying upon first viewing. Two fisherman attempt to collect on a bounty, offered by the young victim's mother, and are pulled into the water when the dock they were fishing from, with a chain and a roast collapses from the clearly immense power of super shark pulling said chain. We again do not see the shark, but a mixture of music and a piece of dock rushing through the water and narrowly missing the fisherman, made for an edge of your seat moment.
The following day we meet Matt Hooper, Richard Dreyfuss, a scientist sent from The oceanographic Institute. He sees the remains of the victim and quickly dismisses anything but a shark attack,including Jack the Ripper. I was in shock that Jack the Ripper was not the culprit, but I digress. A large tiger shark was caught by a group of fishermen attempting to collect the previously mentioned bounty. Matt Hooper,after taking some measurements of the mouth, gave his completely ignored opinion that that was not the correct shark. The loveable mayor of course disagreed, refusing to allow an autopsy to prove it indeed was the shark.
That evening, Hooper convinces terrified of water and intoxicated,Chief Brody, to accompany him on a boat to patrol the waters after they cut open the shark and find no victim inside. They stumble upon a wrecked fishing boat belonging to local fishermen Ben Gardner. Super Genius,Matt Hooper, decides it would be a great idea to jump in the water. In the evening. To look at the boat hull. I mean seems like a great idea to me, two shark attacks in the matter of a couple days. What's the worst that could go wrong? Hooper finds a large tooth stuck in the hull and,upon further examination, we get a wonderful jump scare with the mutilated head of Ben Gardner.
Hooper, unfortunately, dropped the tooth during the horrific ordeal and clearly that was the only proof that the mayor would have accepted for proof of a bigger shark. I mean it makes sense after all, who needs a boat with bite marks and a dead body inside when you can have a tooth. 😐
Here we are Fourth of July weekend and there are tourists everywhere, but all of them are avoiding the water. There are nets and Patrol boats but, go figure, our delightful mayor talks a family into entering the water. The peer pressure was clearly too much for the thousands of followers/tourists as they entered as well. We catch a glimpse of a shark fin cruising through the sea of people, which leads to a panic as everyone rushes to get out of the water. Upon further investigation it is revealed that it was just two children with a cardboard fin. During this distraction,however, a large fin is seen cruising Into the estuary where Brody's oldest son is sailing. A single woman sees the shark and alerts the chief who rushes to save his son. A very unlucky gentleman in a rowboat proves that nice guys finish last as the shark capsizes his dingy and proceeds to ingest him leaving just a leg at the bottom of the "pond".
The chief at this point has had it with the mayor and his money-hungry ways and convinces him to hire shark murdering Quint, Shaw, from earlier in the film, to kill the shark. Quint does some singing, some metaphors, and some spits out some extremely odd terms for everyday objects amd they're off!! The three men set sail in quince vessel the Orca in hopes of bagging The Greatest Prize of any fisherman's life.
The men fill the waters with chum and attempt to hook the beast with a rod and reel. They hook and lose ehat Quint believes is THE SHARK, yet Hopper has other thoughts. Brody begins to chum again,much to his dismay, and for the first time the shark makes itself visible in dramatic fashion. The majectic appeares brings one of the most quoted lines of all time, "you're gunna need a bigger boat." Quint has a unique way of hunting the shark, as we see him use a rifle with a spear tip attached. This speak head is tethered to large yellow barrels that will cause the shark to stay near the surface. The shark quickly disappears with said barrel still attached.
That evening we get one of the best scenes in movie history. The clearly intoxicated men begin comparing scars and telling stories before Quint digs into a story about the USS Indianapolis. This was an absolute amazing acting job by Robert Shaw. The shark attacks the boat and leaves it leaking water.
The following day the barrel surfaces and ends up breaking free of the shark. Quint quickly gets another two barrels into the shark, and they begin the next brilliant plan of tying the barrel rope to the stern cleats. They envisioned the boat dragging the shark to shore, but the shark was having none of that! In an act of fuck you defiance, it decided to tow is very large vessel, complete with three men, backwards causing a large amount of water to enter the boat. They get a third barrel into the shark, as they narrowly escaped sinking. The shark again proves Quint and everyone wrong by submerging with three, yes three, barrels in tow.
The men then attempt heading towards dry land, as the shark followsfor some reason, instead of remaining in a precarious position at sea. However our cocky Captain Quint pushes the engine too hard, and ends up blowing out the engine. Dumb ass.
Hooper finally convinces Quint to allow him to go down into a cage, with poisonous darts, which quickly fails as the massive shark tears the cage apart. Hooper narrowly escapes behind some coral as the shark dismantles what remains of the cage. The shark, in one last showing of defiance, thrusts itself out of the water and on to the stern of the boat before the men could even grieve the koss of their dead (or so they thought) colleague. Sharks are clearly selfish pricks. Quint, in horrific fashion, slides down the stern and into the waiting mouth of the shark.
As the ship is sinking, Brody makes a desperation move and thrusts a compressed air tank into the sharks mouth as he escapes up the mast. After multiple failed shots, we finally see the GLORIOUS end to our monsters destruction as the compressed air tank is hit with a bullet and explodes. Hooper and Brody rendezvous and swim to shore as credits roll.
This will always be one of my favorite movies. The acting is superb, the score breathtaking, and even in the days before CGI the shark is still believable even with its flaws. You absolutely have to open your mind and suspend disbelief, but Jaws does a wonderful job creating suspense. I definitely recommend it to everybody and will continue to do so until until the end of my days.
My goal is to do at least a weekly review of mostly older movies. Money aside, I've been to do a movie blog for years. I look forward to hearing everyone's opinion.