Review of Jaws (1975) by Joseph C — 25 Jul 2015

I admittedly think Steven Spielberg is a rather overrated director - he seems to make quantity over quality - but boy, this film certainly falls into the quality category, and we need to remember this was one of the director's first few movies.

It amazes me that we got such a great film when there were a lot of problems on set, the most significant one being the mechanical shark not working properly. I believe they also weren't on schedule and definitely went over budget for this film. Spielberg was very clever to compensate for the mechanical shark though - he turned to suspense, a la Hitchcock, to frighten the audience by not actually showing the shark until halfway through the film, which was a brilliant decision. Who knows? Maybe the film would have seemed more quirky if more of the mechanical shark was shown if it wasn't malfunctioning.

The character development of Brody is simple, yet really strong and smart for the context of the movie. When you're up against a giant shark to defend an island community, what a train wreck it is to be afraid of the water. At the conclusion with the closing line "I used to hate the water, I can't imagine why" we know he's come full circle - if Brody can take on a monster of the sea, what makes you think water would still scare him?

Jaws also has some really good humor, a lot of it stemming from the character played by Richard Dreyfuss. The quirky shark-studier is a great character to balance out the tension between a man who wants to protect his community and a man who has a personal vendetta against sharks - who by the way delivers one of the best monologues in film history.

One thing that bothers me is that Brody is blamed for the first couple of victims when the mayor of the town puts heavy pressure on Brody to keep the beaches open in order to turn a profit. It doesn't bother me in the sense that it is a bad aspect of the film, it just seems unfair, and you sort of sympathize with Brody since he wanted to protect the community and he let the community down. If anything, this is a great aspect of the film if it gets you to sympathize with Brody like it did for me.

Even though this film is PG, maybe hold off on showing it to kids (unless they close their eyes at certain points) as it can upset them easily - I was terrified of Quint spurting out blood at the end of the film as a child. In general though, this is a movie everyone should see in their lifetime.