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.