Jaws turns 50 this year. What makes this movie so iconic?
For 50 years, Jaws has been entertaining moviegoers. But 27-year-old Steven Spielberg faced problem after problem on the set of his breakout film about a murderous shark.
A new Disney+ documentary, JAWS @ 50: The Definitive Inside Story, explores how these problems helped shape the movie's unforgettable score, frightening practical effects and compelling sense of adventure.
Today on Commotion, superfans and film critics Norm Wilner and Tomris Laffly join guest host Rad Simonpillai to talk about how Jaws changed the way we see cinema — and the ocean — forever.
We've included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, listen and follow Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud on your favourite podcast player.
WATCH | Today's episode on YouTube:
Rad: Tomris, I wanted to talk about the fact that Jaws is not the only shark movie. We've had so many shark movies. We've had so many other Jaws movies! So what is it about Jaws?
Tomris: I mean, look, if the greatest shark movie is made in 1975, people had 50 years to try to do something as good or better — and they haven't even come close to it.
First of all, the horror is orchestrated so perfectly, it's about the unknown monster. The orchestration and the symphony that these characters bring to the movie is just impeccable. Because I feel like every good horror movie should have a heart, should have a centre based in character. You are scared because you are scared [for] the person you care about. If you don't care about that person whose lens you're seeing the movie through, you're not actually going to be scared. You're just going to shrug it off as mindless entertainment, but no, you actually care about these people. That's why it works.
And also some of those shots are just mind boggling, even today, are unmatched. I'm once again going to go back to the Roy Scheider scene on the beach — the zoom and the split diopter — when he's trying to just orchestrate in his head what's happening. No shark movie after that gave me anything like that. I mean, it's based on cheap thrills and sometimes it's fun, this big, mega creature or the super, mega shark comes and bites you. But none of it has been as rooted in character as Jaws has been, which is what makes it a perfect shark movie.
Rad: Norm, talk to me about John Williams's music there and its legacy. What do you think that that really added to Jaws?
Norm: Oh, everything. I don't think the film works without the score. The film is this incredible accident that none of it should have happened the way it happened, we should not have the movie that we have. If the accidents hadn't happened, if the [mechanical] shark had worked, I don't doubt Spielberg would have made a pretty good monster movie — but that's all it would have been. I don't think it would have had the impact that it ultimately did have.
And the score, which is ultimately, it's two notes. And every single person on the planet over the age of 10 knows what that music is. It's remarkable because the simplicity is the thing that drives it. Williams saw this thing as a predator, as an animal, but it's also matching the push of the camera and the sweep of the cinematography. It works in tandem with the film to give the shark a character that it otherwise wouldn't have. Because we are stuck with a prop that doesn't work. Even when you do see the mechanical shark, it's inanimate. The fins don't move, the tail doesn't smash, they roll it on a gimbal when it eats the little Kintner boy on the raft, it's just the prop circling on a big gimbal. Sometimes you see it rise up out of the water and the mouth opens, that's the only thing they could get it to do before it shorted out.
Then you have this incredible cover in Quint's speech about how sharks have lifeless eyes like a doll's eyes. The music is the life. The music is the animation of the animal. It's the personality, it's the cues to the audience to be worried before the people are in the movie. It's a great way of raising suspense before there's any need for it.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CBC
an hour ago
- CBC
The new film Shook captures suburban life in the GTA 'in a very, very beautiful way'
With another buzzy, homegrown movie, this is shaping up to be an exciting year for Canadian film. Shook is filmmaker Amar Wala's first dramatic feature. It follows a struggling writer named Ashish as he falls for a barista, and learns his estranged father has Parkinson's disease. The film is set in Scarborough, Ont., and has been praised for its authentic and loving representation of the community. Today on Commotion, culture critics Jackson Weaver, Rachel Ho and Joyita Sengupta join guest host Rad Simonpillai to discuss the new film, and what it adds to the growing canon of films & TV shows set in the Greater Toronto Area. We've included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, including reviews of the new horror films Weapons and Together, listen and follow Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud on your favourite podcast player. WATCH | Today's episode on YouTube: Rad: The filmmaker Amar Wala is mining his own experiences here. Joyita, when he's doing that, he's tackling the 20-something experience specifically from a South Asian Canadian lens. How do you feel about the way Amar Wala tackles these experiences? Joyita: I mean, they're very specific, which we always love in a film. I'm South Asian, obviously, but I'm also from the ends myself. I'm not from Scarborough. I'm from, like, around Rexdale. I mention that because what he's capturing is a very layered experience. You have this character that's South Asian. He doesn't seem super in touch with his South Asian culture. We never really learn what kind of Indian, or Pakistani, or Bangladeshi or Desi that he is. He doesn't speak his language, even though he immigrated to Canada after a certain age. He does introduce himself as Alex; he says multiple times to other people, not just the girl in the coffee shop. It's interesting because it captures this person who is brown, but their culture is more Scarborough than it is Desi. And I think that is something that a lot of people can relate to. Like, I get it. I'm someone who was born and raised in this city. I have a name that people struggle to pronounce, and there are those aspects of feeling like downtown, the experience of white transplants in the city is so far away from you, and it's just out of reach. This film captures that sort of tension really well. Sometimes I'm someone who doesn't always love a brown-white interracial relationship on-screen, just because it's one that we've seen so many times. But what I think Wala does really well here is capture the tension between these two characters — this feeling of, she can move through the world in a different way than Ashish can. I feel like that is captured well. She doesn't feel like she's talking down to him, that she's looking down on his experiences, but she also is out of depth here. She's like, "I don't know what Hakka food is. I've never been east of, like, Woodbine." As a brown kid from the ends, if you go downtown, that's like a dime a dozen. I've been to a lot of parties where I meet girls like her…. Rad: I think in what you're talking about there is an underlying aspiration for whiteness, on top of being part of the downtown core and all of that stuff.… Rachel, we've actually had a lot of films and TV shows recently that are shining a light on diverse neighborhoods in the Greater Toronto area. I'm thinking of Sort Of, and Late Bloomer, and Boxcutter. What do you think Shook is adding to this canon? Rachel: It's the suburban life. Because normally when you look at a film about Toronto, it is city, like, downtown Toronto. But I love this one's like, he's trying to catch the last train in, or take the blue light bus. That's something that if anybody of us grew up outside of the city, in the suburbs, we all really understand that pain of having to take the blue light bus back home. Like, that sucks. But I love that it's showing a part of Toronto like Scarborough that has been very maligned, and it shows it in a very, very beautiful way. Like, I still have friends who are from Markham and Richmond Hill, and they refuse to go to Scarborough because they're like, "It's scary." I was like, grow up. Yesterday I was walking downtown, and I heard a white guy on the phone like, "You've never been to Scarborough? They have the best food, bro." And I was like, "Oh my, who are you?" So I think there is a growing acknowledgement of Scarborough that has moved on from, certainly, what we grew up with, where Scarborough was looked at in such a demeaning way. And I think mostly it is because of the food, to be honest, because everyone's become so foodie-centric…. I think that this film does a great job of showing all the different aspects of Scarborough, what makes it beautiful — not just the food, but community as well. And it's very refreshing to see that part of the city shown in a way that is very positive. There's no trauma — an immigrant story that doesn't have any trauma to it. That's very nice as well, and something I hope we see more of.
CBC
an hour ago
- CBC
The latest Spike-Denzel collaboration falls flat
Social Sharing Spike Lee and Denzel Washington reunite in a new action film, Highest 2 Lowest, a reimagining of Akira Kurosawa's 1963 film, High and Low. Lee sets the film in New York City, with Washington playing a music mogul who gets caught up in a ransom plot. Today on Commotion, guest host Rad Simonpillai is joined by culture critic Jay Smooth and film critic Sarah-Tai Black to discuss how the movie compares to the Kurosawa classic and where it stands amongst past Spike-Denzel movies. We've included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, listen and follow Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud on your favourite podcast player. WATCH | Today's episode on YouTube: Rad: Sarah-Tai, the Kurosawa — the original — really dealt with social class. And that's something you wanted to talk about when it comes to this movie. So how do you feel about how Spike handled that here? Sarah-Tai: Yeah, I think that the way that Kurosawa's film dealt with class was so, so interesting, especially on a visual level. If you're familiar with it, the film has a two-half structure, where you're pivoted down to the working class urban landscape…. I wish we saw more of that in Highest 2 Lowest because it speaks so clearly to Spike's long-time vision as a filmmaker. And we certainly do get a really great glimpse of that midway through the film, which I think most critics and movie watchers have agreed, there is an excellent peak action moment in the film that speaks to that kind of social commentary and social geography. But those threads get lost in the beginning and in the end of the film. Spike certainly does treat class head-on in certain moments. There's a difference in the way that police treat different people based on their class background, based on the fact that they've been incarcerated or not…. I just don't think he's wildly successful in [his critique]. I think he clearly has a love for working class New York. Again, you can see that in that height of the action of the film, which is the best part of the film. But I do wish there was this more collectivized spirit that we saw throughout the film rather than in just one part. WATCH | The official trailer for Highest 2 Lowest: Rad: Jay, as a New Yorker, how do you feel about the way Spike captures the spirit of New York City? Jay: The movie overall definitely feels like another love letter to Spike's New York. And the opening scene, going through New York's skyline with Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin' from Oklahoma! playing, surprisingly moving to me as a New Yorker. After that, the first half is not quite as resonant to me because it seems to be a pat portrayal of Black elite life…. But in the second half, as soon as they go out into the streets to deal with this kidnapping, I think it really comes alive, especially with this incredible scene. It's a variation of the chase scene on a train that's in the Kurosawa film, but of course we're on the New York City subway, on the day of the Puerto Rican Day Parade. And this really effective action scene gets mixed in with this beautiful cultural celebration centred around a performance by the amazing Latin jazz legend, Eddie Palmieri, and such a beautiful virtuosic scene with the action clicking so well. Such a beautiful tribute, especially at this moment in time when there are a lot of bad faith actors and demagogues out there trying to drive a wedge between Black and Latino people, and to portray immigrants, in general, as the ops for the Black community. It was really moving to me to see Spike take some time in his latest love letter to Black New York to give this love to Puerto Rican, Boricua New York and show how this culture and Eddie Palmieri are a big part of this shared fabric that Spike is always celebrating. That far and away was the highlight of the film to me — and even more poignant with Eddie Palmieri having just passed a couple of weeks ago.
Globe and Mail
2 hours ago
- Globe and Mail
Brent Hinds, ex-member of metal band Mastodon, dies at 51 in motorcycle crash
Brent Hinds, the former singer-guitarist for the Grammy-winning heavy metal band Mastodon, has died in a motorcycle accident in Atlanta, the band and authorities said. He was 51. Hinds was killed while riding a Harley-Davidson motorcycle late Wednesday night when the driver of a BMW SUV failed to yield while making a turn, according to Atlanta police. Hinds was described as 'unresponsive' at the scene. An autopsy concluded Hinds, whose legal first name is William, died of 'multiple blunt force injuries.' 'We are heartbroken, shocked and still trying to process the loss of this creative force with whom we've shared so many triumphs, milestones, and the creation of music that has touched the hearts of so many,' the band said on social media. Mastodon had three albums rise into the Top 10 of the Billboard 200 chart and two that topped the Rock Album chart – 'Emperor of Sand' in 2017 and 'Once More 'round the Sun' in 2014. Hinds co-founded Mastodon in 2000 with bassist Troy Sanders, guitarist Bill Kelliher and drummer Brann Dailor. Mastodon's third studio album, 2006's 'Blood Mountain,' was their first to reach the Top 40, peaking at No. 32 on the Billboard 200. Hinds left the band in March 2025. No reason for the departure was given. The band said they had 'mutually decided to part ways,' but comments made by Hinds on Instagram indicated a rocky relationship with the members of his former band. 'We're deeply proud of and beyond grateful for the music and history we've shared and we wish him nothing but success and happiness in his future endeavors,' the band said at the time. Mastodon – which forged ferocious metal, progressive wizardry and sludge rock tendencies – earned six Grammy Award nominations, winning one in 2017 for best metal performance for 'Sultan's Curse' from the album 'Emperor of Sand.' Rolling Stone magazine listed Mastodon's 2011 album 'The Hunter' among its best off the year, saying the band had 'streamlined their molten thrash into a taut thwump that doesn't pull back one bit on their natural complexity of innate weirdness.' Hinds was due to tour Europe later this year with Fiend Without a Face, a band that was once a side project during his years with Mastodon.
