The Best

Rating: 10/10 (6 November 2002)

JAWS may well be the ultimate horror movie. Made in 1975, it's hard to imagine that it's leanness hasn't influenced the the serial killer/slasher trend of the 1980s, with Jason, Michael and Freddy and their knifes/axes just reincarnations of the Killer Shark's teeth.
Man exists of 90% water and some anthropologists have theorized that our original habitat was the beach, with it's easy pickings of seafood, fish and birds. Perhaps a Jungian terror of what lurks just beneath the ocean's surface has seeped into our very genes after lethal encounters with sharks, jellyfish, portuegese warships, poisonous snakes and tidal waves.
Water is of course also the spiritual element, represented by the color blue.
Whatever the reason, in the year of the Vietnamese Communist takeover of Vietnam, this lean, ruthless, low budget (for Spielberg) gem of a movie was made. Based on a book by Peter Benchley, this movie is at once a metaphor for the power of nature and man's powerlessness in the face of it, and in a strange way a Western, with mad shark hunter Quint as the gunslinger, Chief Brody as the Sheriff, and Mayor Vaughn and the store keepers as the weasly townspeople. Due tribute is also payed to the men of the USS Indianapolis, who delivered the Atom Bomb, and who's return journey was, to say the least, beset with tragedy.
When it first came out, it scared me out of going near the local ditch, let alone the beach and later, I had to think twice to even go near the water line. Great use of suspense, great use of music to enhance the expectation and terror, this is a showcase of what a talented director can do with our most existential fears.
The movie itself is part monster movie, part guys on a mission movie, part revenge movie and as such is very engaging.
Even a quarter of a century after it was made, it hasn't really dated and can be viewed again and again. One of the best movies of all time and possibly the greatest horror movie of all time. Highly recommended.