My 29 year old daughter was over a couple of nights ago and was looking through my DVDs for something to watch. She picked out ' Jaws' and told me she had never seen it. We watched it and she said she wasn't overly impressed. She felt a lot of the ' scary/suspenseful ' moments were telegraphed in advance and not that well done. She also felt it was dated and didn't give a fig it was a Spielberg movie. Has ' Jaws' lost its bite?
I saw Jaws for the first time last year. I found it very entertaining....I enjoyed seeing first hand the origin of so many cultural references and spoofs...that being said, it definitely felt more like a comedy than a suspense though.....
I had actually seen Jaws 2 before Jaws and because of that, I wasn't impressed the first time. Actually I saw it in the mid 80s and, personally I've never thought it was one of his best films. I've grown to like it, but the shock value would never be the same as seeing it in 1977. BTW a little off topic....I bet if you showed her all the classic Spielberg films, you'd might be surprised that she doesn't like those either....starting with ET
It's one of my favourite movies of all time. Sure some of the shark effects may date it a little, especially when it's head breaks the surface, but I don't care. The opening sequence of the swimmer at night still gives me chills. I love the characters, the set-up and the battle at sea. The look on Quint's face when he sees those three barrels get taken under ........ and I imagine myself on that crappy old boat that's taking water, with a captain that's unhinged and no radio contact ...... no thanks.
Jaws is best experienced in the theater. It will always be an all time classic to me, and Quint will always be one of the greatest characters in cinema.
I'm not wild about ET either and I was the target audience when it came out. The score, however, is still one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard. I still find Jaws entertaining , but so much of what it did has become absorbed into filmmaking language and is now probably so cliche that I wouldn't be surprised if someone who grew up on two generations of movies since isn't impressed. They've seen it all before.
I broke up with a girl who hated “ET” because I figured she was soulless. I blubbered like a baby, even when I was 18, when I saw it and fell in love with ET. My daughter couldn’t stop crying for a half hour when I showed it to her at age nine and I had to take her for ice cream!. “ET” is my “empathy yardstick” when it comes to people. Same with Close Encounters. No tears? I’m suspicious. Lol
My 13-year old daughter loves Jaws. We've watched it twice in the last year and she thinks it's terrific. If I suggested watching it again tonight she'd be all for it. The characters make it - it isn't even so much about the terror as it is about the wonderful ambience of the bustling town of Amity, and the hilarious interaction of Brody, Quint and Hooper on the boat.
No. You need to explain context and the times, what Jaws meant to the career of Spielberg, the movie industry (one of the first summer blockbusters) and the culture at large. Merchandise sold based on a movie. The fact that they actually had to shoot on location, manually manipulate the special effects, no CGI, no green screen. Tell her it cost them 9 mil to make, and it took in over 470 mil, thus was considered a very huge success in 1975-76. Maybe she didnt much like it due to the lack of female characters in the film. The victim, the chief's wife, and the mother who slapped the chief were about the only ones I remember, and only briefly on the screen.
I saw it at a theatre when it was released and you better believe that when the shark came up out the water that time that building shook !
In the same vein, don't recommend SILENCE OF THE LAMBS to anyone under 40. That movie gets re-made multiple times weekly on TV shows, many of them more graphic than the R-rated original. I can't think of another iconic movie that's been more widely imitated.
And maybe no Quint. Was you daughter watching it to specifically be scared ? For today's 29 year olds, yeah it probably doesn't hold much of a scare factor, unless you have a fear of sharks or being stranded in the open ocean, but you can still appreciate it for what it is and just enjoy the story and the characters. I guess it also depends on how much you want to immerse yourself in the story. If she's looking for some '70s scares ...... have you tried the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Exorcist, Halloween, or Black Christmas ? All of these have moments which have stayed with me ever since seeing them. This isn't actually a bad list with a mixture of old and new, so it may offer more for modern tastes and it's interesting that Jaws comes in at Number 7 .... The 30 best horror movies that will haunt you long after the credits roll | GamesRadar+
Wayyyyy too much character development, and not enough instant gratification for most younger audiences. Also- Modern horror tends to confuse being startled with being scared.
Jaws still works for me. The first time I saw it was at a drive-in when it first came out. I'm glad that they didn't film it as it was written in the novel.
It still has bite for people on the coast. There’s nothing worse than when you’re tubing behind a motorboat in the ocean and you fall off and start to think of Jaws while waiting for the boat to circle back.
My partner doesn't want me to show our kids any Jaws scenes yet as she reckons it will wreck our summer trips to the beach ..... and she's probably right.
It hasn't lost anything. It does help to see in a theater or on the biggest screen possible. What helps most is to realize that most of the film is very accurate to nature...(minus the shark stalking, jumping on the boat and tank explosion etc.) Fewer and fewer today simply do not have the open mindedness to appreciate things from the past-even if they still work properly. For a more visceral approach try DUEL. And if she doesn't like Raiders then I don't know what to tell you. For me personally: I've always disliked E.T. It was so darn saccharine and lacked much bite for me even as a kid. I get it and why people are so attached to it but for me CEOT3K was the film for adults and like minded viewers. Then in middle school I saw Blade Runner for the first time and realized it was buried in the year of ET which only furthered my contempt for ET. I have also played the Atari classic which of course would make anyone loathe ET.
