November 11, 2013

Movie Night: Jaws.


Review #480: Jaws.

Cast
Roy Scheider (Martin Brody), Robert Shaw (Quint), Richard Dreyfuss (Matt Hooper), Lorraine Gary (Ellen Brody), Murray Hamilton (Mayor Vaughn), Carl Gottlieb (Meadows), Jeffrey Kramer (Hendricks), and Susan Backlinie (Chrissie) Directed by Steven Spielberg  (#126 - Close Encounters of the Third Kind, #168 - Raiders of the Lost Ark, #169 - Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, #170 - Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, #302 - Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, #351 - Schindler's List)

Review
What can you say about Jaws, one of the first summer blockbusters, and Spielberg's first major success as a director, with the film that started the "animals gone bad genre", as I like to call it with examples like Piranha, Grizzly (which I will review eventually) Alligator, Day of the Animals, The Swarm, and several others. Roy Scheider does a fine job, as does Dreyfuss, but Robert Shaw is memorable and stands out especially in a sea of fine actors, much like how he did in From Russia With Love, for example. The terror is exceptionable, made more scary with the music by John Williams, and the fact you don't see the shark in person until over an hour in, providing much suspense. Despite a hectic production, the film was an exceptional success, and this film is, and always will be the best shark film ever made.

Overall, I give it 10 out of 10 stars.

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