44 Days to Halloween- 1975 Jaws

Over the next 100 days, I will present one movie of significances in horror, suspense or thrillers for each year from 1919 to 2018. The next film presented here is 1975 thriller "Jaws" starring Roy Scheider, Richard Dreyfuss, Robert Shaw, Murray Hamilton, Lorraine Gary and directed by Steven Spielberg.

Jaws (1975)

Dir- Steven Spielberg

As a child, the drive-in was a blessing in the ultimate cinematic sense. One of my best memories was that of the chilling sound of the John William's Oscar-winning Jaws theme. Steven Spielberg's adaptation of a rather mediocre Peter Benchley novel is a return to the major elements of fear and the use of suspense in telling a story. A large man-eating shark besieges a small coastal town during its vacation season. The local town officials wish to downplay the danger in the hope of increasing tourism, but the local sheriff knows better and makes it his goal to prove it. Enlisting the aid of a marine biologist and a salty fisherman, the three men go out to confront the ultimate sea predator. Spielberg takes cues from such great sea films as Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Old Man and The Sea and Moby Dick to craft a genuinely scary tale that reaches into peoples fears and emotions, never before has one man made so many people fear the ocean. After 40 years the fear of the depths and sharks is still very much in the hearts of most people, and with a dramatic decline in numbers, the shark may well face extinction at the hands of those who fear it most. A commercial and critical success, Jaws is one of the all-time highest grossing horror movies, and unfortunately, we ended up with three rather horrible sequels and a whole school of cheap copycats.