Jaws: Fear of Getting Into The Sea

This movie still haunts me, and I was afraid of coming to the water the first time I watched it. I remember back in 1960, there was one famous movie that crossed the barrier of every Hollywood’s rule to be one of the greatest films of all time and also the biggest fear of audiences back then when they did not even want to shower. It was Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock. Psycho and Jaws had one thing in common: attacking the fear in everyone—fear of being killed behind a shower curtain and being eaten by sharks.

Source: IMDb

Stephen Spielberg is a great Hollywood director. Each movie of his always left every audience with the best experiences ever. Jaws was no exception, and Stephen Spielberg successfully approached this creative and costly film-making dilemma. Back then, the visual effect was limited, but directors needed to make high-quality movies. A famous example was Star Wars in 1977 by George Lucas. Returning to Jaws, Spielberg knew how to scare the audience with all the jump scares of sharks, the suspense, and the anxiety of audiences when they saw scenes where people were getting into the water. They did not know what would happen to those people, and adding the music score from John William increased the horror of this movie. Even though Spielberg did not use the real sharks, I, or any audience back then, thought it was real, and it made me more fearful when thinking, what if those sharks were real and ate people?

Yes, the film would be better if it was made today using sharks generated by CGI. The development in using all kinds of special effects, even the IMax in movies, is necessary because it brings the audience the best movie experience ever and makes them feel like they are actually in the movie. If Jaws were made today with CGI, first, it would have rated R because there would definitely be some bloody and violent scenes, and second, the audience would have seen the shark jump out the screen by watching IMax. Jaws would still be a big box office hit if it was made today.