If ever there was justification for being terrified of sticking a toe in the ocean, it's “Jaws”. Director Steven Spielberg's fantastic piece of art really had its sheer ability to grip an audience. Before even viewing the movie, who knew a movie made in the mid 1970’s would have carried such action and suspense. This movie completely exceeded my expectations for a typical 70’s movie.
As this movie beginned, we were put in a dark atmosphere on Small Island, community of Amity, a vacationer, named Chrissie Watkins in the dark getting chased by another guy on the beach, decides to take a swim in the water, while its pitch black, and all of a sudden… after all the screams of joys, the area goes quiet. There are no surrounding sounds. We then swiftly see this young lady getting attacked and we see all this happening through the Sharks point of view. Early morning on the next day, Martin Brody, new chief police of Amity was put on the search to investigate this horrifying and tragic incident.
As the movie went about, more deaths seemed to just occur. As parents enjoyed and soaked up the sun as watching their children and other children playing, a group of children went racing towards the ocean to play some games and have fun splashing one another in the water. One child, named Alex Kintner, decided to go surfing. With the incorporation of several jump cuts, where the camera man shows the audience the kids splashing the water everywhere, in a matter of seconds the suspenseful music switches on and you further know something bad was about to happen or has just happened. All children rush immediately out of the waters, as they leave the ocean empty. Come to think of it, maybe the ocean wasn’t that empty after all… Within minutes Alex Kintner was pronounced dead.
Now, if you think the beginning of the movie was intense, wait until you see the few last scenes shot in the movie. Midway through the film, we are shown that three men were going to go on a little escapade and try their best to sail the oceans and capture the hidden monster whose taking lives as we speak! In this scene where we see Quint, chief Brody and Matt Hooper, there were a lot of selected types of camera movements that occurred. For example, the majority of the techniques that was used were the use of canted angles. As this long and treacherous journey develops for the three young men, unfortunately, Quint was the one to be attacked and killed by the shark, and his body is dragged under the water so no one can try to save him. After a terrifying and exhausting trip, chief Brody and Matt Hooper are the ones to finally capture this beast and once again peace, happiness and safety is yet again restored back into this little community of Amity.
All in all, even though this is one of the older movies, with all the techniques incorporated, including camera movement, sound effects and the many use of transitions, I would have to say that Jaws is a quite interesting movie to watch and, surprisingly, clutches on to your attention as soon as you hear the dangerous, yet threatening music play softly in the background. Dun, dun, dunnnnnnn!!!
