An American classic, Steven Spielberg's Jaws definitely left a good first impression on me. For so many years I have been reluctant to watch this film, thinking, "oh it's just some movie about a shark, what's the big deal? People get eaten by some sharks, and they die. Ok." I've always known it for its signature soundtrack, the rapidly increasing "dun dun," almost to the point of annoyance. This all changed once I viewed it for the first time yesterday. Almost immediately after it began, I could feel a bit of tension in the air since I knew that someone was going to be devoured. However, I did not know when, or who.
After some establishing shots of the teenagers' summertime party, two of them broke off from the rest of the group to go for a sensual swim. Having drank too much booze, the boy (Tom) passed out on the beach while the girl (Chrissie) was in the water. Right when everything was eerily quiet, a shark latched onto her body and pulled her down into the dark, cold ocean. Spielberg did a great job setting up this scene: the dark atmosphere coupled with just two out of the numerous teens, who were alone, conveyed an uneasy feeling to the viewer. You could just tell something wasn't right.
The morning after, two police officers named Martin Brody and Jeffrey Hendricks went searching for Chrissie, who was reported missing. Hendricks had stumbled upon the young teen's corpse lying on the beach. That's definitely not something you they see everyday. And with that being said, Brody became deeply concerned at this horrible sight. Just think, a shark attack in New England? When does that ever happen? Realizing the severe threat that this situation posed to the residents of this beach community, Brody wasted no time in shutting the beach down. At this point Brody was met with a colossal amount of opposition from the town's mayor. His main concern was the most evil force in the world: money. Amity was a beach town, and it would absolutely kill their tourism business if word about a shark attack got around. He seemed to think that Brody was crazy for even considering that a tragic event like this happened. "She was probably just hit by a boat," he said. Yeah right.
A few days afterwards, Brody visited the beach and sat in a chair on the sand. As a swimmer teased him about being afraid of the water, he nervously stared at the ocean, worried that there would be another shark attack. Once again, Spielberg did a great job when he added two teasers: an elderly swimmer with a cap that resembled a shark's fin, and a few people playing below the water's surface, screaming. Since both Brody and I were on edge, we mistook these teasers for shark attacks. But this all changed shortly after a group of kids went into the water. The oceanic beast tried to attack them, but luckily they were able to get out, except for one little boy named Alex. Nice job, Mayor. Way to keep your people safe.
During a meeting with the townspeople and the mayor, the decision was made to close the beach for 24 hours. A fisherman offered to capture the shark for $10,000, but no one was willing to spend that much money. That night, some local fisherman tried to take on this task, but they almost ended up killing themselves. The next day, a scientist from the Oceanographic Institute came in, and proved Brody's theory to be correct. It was a shark attack, not some boating accident. When a shark was captured a few days after, the scientist identified it as a tiger shark, saying that its bite radius did not match that of Alex's laceration. In other words, they didn't catch the shark that bit him, or Chrissie. It was still out there, waiting to take its next victim.
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