Junkyard Jaws

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ museum is going to need a bigger building as it has announced that the fourth and final surviving shark taken from the original mold is set to be the largest item on display...25 feet, just not three tons of him - he's only made out of fibreglass after all.

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Jaws With....

Every so often Hollywood will make a hit film that will have such a cultural impact that it will radiate a slew of lesser quality cash ins and knock offs. We had years of it post Die Hard with Die Hard on a bus, plane, ship, train etc.

The same thing happened with Jaws as Hollywood discovered that nature just kept on fighting back...mostly badly. Even the posters, covering everything from Tentacles to Blood Beach feature a scantily clad young woman in distress (and little else) about to be enveloped by the corresponding film’s creature.

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House Shark Needs You!

I found myself thinking of new plays on not only “Jaws” but even other “Jaws” knock offs that came out shortly after it and in the years that followed, movies like “Grizzly”, “Piranha”, “Alligator”, “Blades” and so forth.  But the main focus was “Jaws”, and I thought of ways to pay homage to all the great moments and characters in that movie, big and small.  Some are obvious, well know and quoted often, but others would only be caught by the hardcore “Jaws” fan.

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The Daily Jaws Book Club: Jaws

Jaws, seems such an obvious title doesn’t it? That wasn’t always the case though, so you could have been reading this article on The Daily The Stillness in the Water or The Daily Leviathan Rising. Thankfully, some 125 titles later, we ended up with the Jaws title we know and love.

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Finales: Jaws vs Jurassic Park

Perhaps one of the most memorable parts of Jaws was its epic finale. The final sequence of Steven Spielberg’s classic gave audiences an unforgettable conclusion to an unforgettable film. But what makes a masterpiece ending? What about a finale leaves audiences cheering through the end credits? 

Today, I’d like to analyze the ending of this film, and compare it to the finale of another Spielberg classic, Jurassic Park, to see exactly what makes these films go out with a bang (in the case of Jaws, literally).

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The 12 Days Of Jawsmas

There's been lots of talk about whether Die Hard was or wasn't a Christmas film and although Jaws isn't (Jaws The Revenge actually is set at Christmas, perhaps that is why it is a turkey of a film. Check out my 30th anniversary look back at it here "Jaws Poor"), I thought the original Spielberg classic had many elements that lent itself to the Christmas story (sort of).

 

But Jaws is set in July!

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Bruce: The Beautiful Terror of a Mechanical Shark

The evolution of a mechanical shark puppet that affected the history of cinema (and indeed, maybe even theme park engineering)  still continues to fascinate us – and part of the reason may have something to do with the uncanny valley aspect of it all. This knowledge that those puppets aren’t the real deal, even after seeing behind the scenes footage with multiple wires poking out of the shark’s stomach, we can still watch Jaws and be just as terrified and mystified by this gigantic fish, even after 40 + years. 

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