Jaws @ 50: The Definitive Inside Story (2025)

Director: Laurent Bouzereau

Cast: Steven Spielberg, Peter Benchley, Janet Maslin, Emily Blunt

Have I Seen It Before: This is definitely the kind of review where answering that question first might prove to jump into the meat of the review before its time.

Did I Like It: The opening minutes—and, indeed, the trailer—to this documentary both recognizes the challenge it has in front of us, and poses an intriguing question which will fuel the next hour and a half.

Is there anything you haven’t said about Jaws (1975)?

If there is truly anything that hasn’t been said about that point of origin for the modern blockbuster, I can’t fathom what it is, and Spielberg, too, find the question both intriguing and daunting.

Does the film actually reveal much new about Jaws. Not… really. The old hits are touched on, sure. Benchley’s book is startlingly different than the book, especially when it isn’t dealing with its titular shark*. The shark didn’t work, then it did, necessitating that we see as little of it as possible, to great effect. If Richard Dreyfuss** could throw a punch, it is entirely possible he and Robert Shaw would have killed one another. People were terrified of the water in the late 70s, and took it out on otherwise unassuming sharks.

It’s not nearly the revelation that the thesis question presents. That’s ultimately because there may not be much new to say about the subject after all. A vignette where Spielberg lightly admits to a modicum of PTSD in the years after the experience is a new depth into a subject that was already known.

Also, Emily Blunt is a pretty huge fan of the movie. I’m fully willing to admit I didn’t know that going in.

*Lora and I read it definitely, and the biggest revelation there is that Spielberg was elevating material before anyone even realized what he was capable of.

**If memory serves, there’s a drop or two of bad blood between the once and future Hooper and Spielberg, perhaps explaining why he only appears in the film via stock footage from the behind-the-scenes featurette when the film was first released on DVD.

Oppenheimer (2023)

Director: Christopher Nolan

Cast: Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Matt Damon, Robert Downey Jr.

Have I Seen it Before: Nope. Brand new. I’ll occasionally detour in this section of a review and talk about the movie going experience. I could take a moment (again) to extoll the virtues of seeing movies actually projected on film (Oppenheimer is shaping up to be the third film I have seen this year projected on 35mm), or wonder if I will make a second trip to a theater to try to take in the film on IMAX, as I live in one of those unluckily uncivilized parts of human civilization without a 70mm venue (more on that in a bit), but what I really would like to do is give a message to that guy with the two cokes. I won’t get into it too much, but the fact that it took you the better part of twenty minutes to realize you had intended to go see Barbie will be something many of us will never forget.

Did I Like It: Before, people might look at you a little sideways if you made a declaration like Christopher Nolan is the closest thing a generation like ours is going to get to a Stanley Kubrick. The idea that Kubrick would be found within 1000 miles of a Batman movie is equal parts insanely intriguing and just insane, and one usually had to ignore most of Tenet (2020) (which I probably need to give another shot), but that pure devotion to the camera as quite possibly the most important part of the film at hand gives them both the same ambition.

Now we can say—without getting those funny looks, mind you—that Nolan even succeeds in that ambition. All of the tools of a master filmmaker are put to use, and that use is not some genre entertainment. I have no beef with genre entertainment. Without it, I might cease to exist altogether. But the next time someone complains that movies aren’t real movies anymore, I think they are having the unfortunate inherent myopia of someone seeing things as they happen. One might long for the days of the New Hollywood, where Lucas was making THX 1138 (1971) and Coppola could nearly bring a studio to the brink of bankruptcy, but those days had their lauded turkeys and bland entertainments, too*. Oppenheimer will be one of those movies we remember.

It is intense. It is merciless. It runs through its material with no real need to graft a heroic arc onto J. Robert Oppenheimer (Murphy). I listened to the source material, American Prometheus, earlier this year and to my observations there appeared to not be much—if any—dramatic embellishment to bring the story to the screen. It’s a bold move that could have backfired and made the film frightfully boring. And yet, it isn’t. Oppenheimer is easily one of the best films of the year, and may yet take my top spot.

One other note I can’t help but make: I saw a comment—the source of which escapes me, tragically—which said that it is rare to see a film where there are easily close to a dozen career-best performances from bona fide movie stars. That’s true, but it would be hard to honestly engage with a review without dwelling on what Robert Downey Jr. has done here. For years he had been giving the best performances in tiny films, even when he wasn’t necessarily conscious of what he was doing. Then, surprising nearly everyone, he became the world’s biggest movie star. One might point to Dolittle (2020) as a sign that he couldn’t keep making franchises forever, but I imagine if he was committed to the idea of playing Iron Man forever, even in films which had nothing to do with Marvel Comics, he would have had more successes than failures in the long run. Instead, he tries now to surprise us all again and remind us why we all thought he was great in the first place.

*Granted, all of those trifles were shot on film, so even something like The Love Bug (1971), were it released today, would be in serious contention for a Best Cinematography Oscar.

A Quiet Place (2018)

Director: John Krasinski

Cast: John Krasinski, Emily Blunt, Millicent Simmonds, Noah Jupe

Have I Seen It Before?: Yes. It feels so strange to come back around to films that I had first seen just before I started writing these reviews. In fact, I had to double check to make sure I hadn’t already written a review. I guess that is what life will be like from now. That, and Purell. And, if this film is any indication, silence.

Did I like it?: I think the only flaw you can lay at this film’s feet is one of which most viewers would indict most horror films. Why are the characters making the decisions they make?

The Abbott family (even after this second viewing, I am almost certain that they are never referred to by name during the film, and only during the closing credits) have made valiant efforts to exist within this eradicated world, far more than I would ever be interested in. I’ve thought this while watching The Walking Dead, but if wi-fi was down for longer than 48 hours, I’d be ready for early checkout from the planet. 

But was there any talk (or gesturing, naturally) on the subject of birth control in this house?

I suppose I can understand the grief of their youngest child dying at the claws of the ear-o-morph influencing Mr. (Krasinski) and Mrs. (Blunt) to find comfort in the prospect of giving birth to another child, but as prepared as these folks were for life under the audio goblins, they were not prepared for post-natal care. In all fairness, though, I do tend to look at people having kids in our current situation as being cursed with an excess of optimism.

While I can never fully escape this line of thinking when watching the movie, the writer in me realizes it is essential to the creation of tension throughout. Nary a moment is wasted in the film, even with those parts where I’m screaming at the screen “Why would you do that to yourself?!” It’s a tightly packed thriller that you would never have expected to come from the guy who spent the better part of ten years smirking at the camera.

This doesn’t even being to cover the sound design of the film. Pitch perfect in every single moment, all the more impressive when a film insists on this level of pristine sound design.

Honestly, I’m willing to forgive the pregnancies if we can all decide to focus on the sound.