The incredibly rough shoot for Jaws has been well-documented, but the film was such a smash that there were many attempts to duplicate its success. Pop Quiz… what’s the 2nd Greatest Shark Thriller? Some will go right to Jaws 2. There’s Deep Blue Sea, Open Water or The Meg. Non-shark films inspired by Jaws do fairly better: Orca, Alligator and Piranha. The next title on our list is 2016’s The Shallows, and at our current pace it’ll come up February 2027.
What does Jaws get so right? You have to start with Spielberg getting that perfect blend of scares, adventure and humor. The most incredible piece of good luck was having to film around the shark because it usually didn’t function right. This saved the movie because in many of the shots late in the film where you get the full ‘Bruce’ it’s always looked pretty fake. In its place, we get just a fin and John Williams’ score to stand-in for the shark, so that when it does appear, Roy Scheider delivers one of the most memorable lines in cinema, “You’re gonna need a bigger boat.”
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