Shark Attacked – Jaws 1975 – Movie ReviewA Shark AttackedThe movie Jaws (1975), directed by Steven Spielberg, permanently altered the perception of sharks and instilled a fear that still remains in the United States thirty-four years later. This fear can be classified scientifically as ‘selachophobia and has become a problem for many would be swimmers and ocean explorers. Businesses have popped up with the pharmaceutical demand for phobia medication along with therapeutic treatment, the merchandizing of the shark, and for the recent demand for shark fin for soups. Commercial fishing, pharmaceutical companies, and merchandizing companies have capitalized on the movie Jaws. The misconception of sharks has been accepted as part of pop-culture and there have been very little efforts to stop its mischaracterization except by sorrowful movie writer Peter Benchley. Jaws has been indirectly responsible for the wide-scale and irresponsible slaughter of sharks all over the world since 1975 and has contributed to the decline of the worldwide shark population.
In the movie Jaws, Spielberg portrays the shark as a killing machine and shows the sharks power and aggression in its frequent shark attacks to small town beaches. The number of shark attacks that take place along with the likelihood of constant feeding of humans rather than other prey is extremely unrealistic. The frequency of the shark attacks in this movie has people thinking that at any moment while their swimming at the beach they could be the next victim of a flesh eating shark. The fear of not knowing when the shark might attack is the most key part to the phobia. In Jaws, they made the sharks out to be smart sophisticated hunters when in reality, the only hunting moves they actually put on their potential preys are the angles they go about in their attack. A sharks brain is not large enough to think things through and use logic. The functions that their brain can perform are simply based on their own and survival instincts which they have evolved for millions of years. The misconception of the shark to become a vicious, vengeful, killing machine towards humans has become the common characterization in American culture.
Spielberg in his production stages of the movie Jaws, had mechanical difficulties with the shark and had to resort to a different method of illustrating its killer mentality. Spielberg turned to representing the shark with floating yellow barrels and frightening music creating a great suspense. The sheer fact that the shark could not be seen but could strike at any time provoked this same belief for many coastal beach dwellers in American culture. When Jaws did arise from the sea the size of the shark was not comparable to a great white: Spielberg intended for the shark to be comparable to the prehistoric megaladon, which was almost 49 feet long. Even after the movie was released U.S. beaches reported a downturn in tourism. Jaws
— in spite of the dramatic increase the shark’s size, still not to the level that he achieved in Jurassic Park. In the film the shark, with no tail and no hands, had a natural instinct for speed, maneuvering fast and with no tail to try to slow a human head along the waterline. Even so, he did not see the opportunity to use his tail to slow a human body along the waterline. It was only in Jaws for a short period that one of Spielberg’s best films, The Great Gatsby, became widely acknowledged as some of Spielberg’s masterpieces and was a top-notch movie from then on. Jaws is perhaps his best work to date with his iconic character having no tail.
–2 Jaws is the biggest of all of Spielberg’s movies. Despite the massive movie and director’s efforts, Jaws did little to help to revitalize the beach community, a fact that will be demonstrated later when the movie is compared to the first Jurassic Park, which was the largest beach in its scope.
–3 In this section you may discuss the following subjects with your own interpretation of “jaws”
–1 The use of animals in Jaws also makes you think of the animals portrayed by Steven Spielberg as being more intelligent. He is especially fond of elephants in Jaws.
–2 If you are a human being, then you will also see that all of these concepts are in effect metaphors for humans, in the film as it’s been portrayed by Steven Spielberg.
–3 Even the most cynical of modern Westerners (e.g., if you prefer the term American Indians, for example) may see Jaws as reflecting their lack of belief in the notion of aliens. But if you’re a Westerner, you may have noticed that all these concepts are being seen in our culture as if they’re metaphors for the people of Asia and Africa.
–4 The use of animals in Jaws also makes you think of the animals portrayed by Steven Spielberg as being more intelligent. He is particularly fond of elephants in Jaws.
–5 We may even find the use of elephants in Jaws especially disturbing, especially as it’s a metaphor for the way in which some Western people have considered African cultures to be “primitives” and how these cultures have been treated by Westerners.
–6 One of the most important concepts found in the movie is that human characters are inextricably linked to dinosaurs. This is quite an interesting observation, as dinosaurs are mentioned in Jurassic Park.
–7 But one element that has been highlighted in this section will be that dinosaurs are not really apes.
–8 So we must wonder what is to be said of this premise of the movie. However, it