June 20, 1975: "Jaws" Premieres

June 20, 1975, 50 years ago: Jaws premieres, turning Steven Spielberg into a star director, and inventing the "Summer blockbuster film."

It was based on the novel of the same title, by Peter Benchley, grandson of Robert Benchley of Algonquin Round Table fame. He later regretted writing the book, because the movie led people to go out and kill sharks who had done nothing wrong.

Steven Spielberg was only 27 years old during filming, but he was already a genius, capable of out-Hitching Alfred Hitchcock for fear, suspense and characterization.

The movie was filmed on Martha's Vineyard, off the coast of Massachusetts, and "The Vineyard" stood in for the fictional Amity Island.

Roy Scheider, having previously played a second banana in The French Connection, proved that you didn't have to look like Steve McQueen, Paul Newman or Robert Redford to be an action hero.

Richard Dreyfuss, having played teenagers in American Graffiti and The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, was so much better playing a young, thoughtful scientist like Hooper than being a rotten old man. It's one thing to play a mean old Republican, like he did in The American President and W., and he was damn good at both. It's another thing to be one.

English actor Robert Shaw played Quint, who became a shark-hunter after surviving the shark attack on the survivors of the Japanese attack on the USS Indianapolis in the waning days of World War II. Surviving a harrowing wartime experience should make a man less of a jerk, not more. Quint never figured this out.

Murray Hamilton played Mayor Larry Vaughn, a coward who pandered to local businesses. He would have made a great modern Southern Republican. In contrast, as Chief Brody, Scheider gives off serious "I'm a Republican of conscience, and that's why I'm now a guest on MSNBC at least 3 times a week" vibes.

Look, I get why some people root for the shark. Frankly, I wept not at all when it chomped Quint up. I would have cheered if it had gotten that useless Mayor, the real villain of the movie. But you're not supposed to root for the shark, any more than you root for the witch in The Wizard of Oz, or Barzini in The Godfather, or Darth Vader in Star Wars, or Thanos in the Marvel movies.

"Smile, you son of a bitch!" is a better "I'm about to kill you!" line than was ever delivered by John Wayne, and neither Clint Eastwood, nor Sylvester Stallone, nor Arnold Schwarzenegger, nor Bruce Willis has ever topped it, either. Nor will they, in whatever time is left to them.

There were 3 sequels by 1987. The less said about them, the better.

Shaw died in 1978, Hamilton in 1986, Scheider in 2008. As of June 20, 2022, Spielberg, Dreyfuss, and Lorraine Gary, who played Ellen Brody, the Chief's wife, are still alive.

I don't like horror movies, and Jaws has too much screaming for me to buy some people's argument that it's a "perfect movie." But it's a great movie, one proven by both the post-9/11 hysteria and COVID to have stood the test of time.