Big, Bad Shark = Great, Big Success

Rating: 9/10 (11 August 2003)

This is one of the greatest bits of filmmaking in history. Everything about this film makes it one of the best ever. The setting, the writing, the casting, the acting, and - most importantly - the believability that something like this could really happen. Just stop to think how many people wouldn't go in the water after this film because of how terrified of sharks they were. It's mind-boggling! A movie like this is so good because the audience can really transport themselves into it and become lost in it, maximizing the entertainment value of the movie. I completely lose it whenever I watch Quint's speech about the USS Indianapolis, because Shaw is so convincing in conveying the pain his character feels when recounting the horrific ordeal of the ship's crew. He immediately becomes humanized, rather than just being "that crazy old Ahab-type fellow."
True, the book was a great work of literature, and there were quite a few liberties taken in the transition from page to screen, but that was necessary. Anyone who has read the book will tell you that there were things that needed to be omitted, and things that had to be altered. Hey, even Peter Benchley himself felt things needed to be changed for the adaptation, so he took the task himself. And that's why the film works just as well as the book - the same man was able to take one masterpiece and change just enough so that it became another masterpiece.