Review: “Spectre”

November 13, 2015November 28, 2015 Garrett Reviews 007, Casino Royale, Christoph Waltz, Daniel Craig, Dave Bautista, filmmaking, James Bond, Lea Seydoux, Quantum of Solace, review, Sam Mendes, Skyfall, Spectre, spy

I was really enjoying “Spectre,” the 24th film in the James Bond series, for the first hour and a half. Had it ended there, this would be a positive review. But it didn’t.

It’s hard to talk about this film without delving into spoilers, so I’m not even going to try. You’ve been warned!

Sam Mendes, responsible for the previous (and best) entry, “Skyfall,” returns to the director’s chair. He brings his fluid sense of action and a knack for making sure every penny of the budget shows up on screen. The film opens in Mexico during a Day of the Dead celebration. Mendes and cinematographer Hoyte Van Hoytema craft an elaborate long take which follows James Bond (Daniel Craig) as he tracks a target through the festivities. I suspect friend of the blog, Ben, would call this an embodiment of the Bond experience: exotic locations and grand spectacle mixed with intrigue.

As things are wont to do in this franchise, everything goes to hell. Bond finds himself running from a collapsing building and then chasing his target right into a departing helicopter. (So much running! Where’s Tom Cruise when you need him.) Here we have a spectacular blend of what looks to be location photography and a gyrating set, the actors rolling and bouncing inside, as 007 tries to take control of the aircraft.

Bond discovers that he’s embroiled in a larger conspiracy involving a nefarious organization known as Spectre. After learning that a former nemesis, Mr. White, has ties to the group, he pays him a visit. In an attempt to gain leverage over the man, Bond vows to protect his daughter Madeleine (Léa Seydoux). Simultaneously, M (Ralph Fiennes) is wrestling with Max Denbigh (Andrew Scott), a member of the British government trying to coalesce intelligence organizations from several countries into one massive, Orwellian security group.

Now, things aren’t all expensive tuxedos and vodka martinis during the first half of the film. There’s some eye-rolling dialog like, “As you know, 007, [insert something that Bond clearly does know but we the audience don’t].” And poor Dave Bautista (more on him later) and Monica Bellucci are completely wasted as a henchman and Bond girl respectively. But it isn’t until shortly after our hero meets up with Madeleine that that delicious vodka martini ends up all over that nice tuxedo.

Few and far between are the Bond girls that develop any real connection to James. That’s certainly attempted here, but the film doesn’t lay the groundwork. By the end of “Spectre,” we’re to believe that Bond would give up his double-0 license for a life with Madeleine, but we’ve no reason to think their relationship is any more special than the countless women he’s shagged. Frequent callbacks to Vesper Lynd, perhaps the best Bond girl in the series, don’t help. She was smart, resourceful and complex in her own right. We saw her relationship to Bond develop in “Casino Royale.” Not the case here.

Now we come to the film’s other crippling problem. The head of Spectre is Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Christoph Waltz). He is and always has been the franchise’s big bad. The Joker to Bond’s Batman. The Moriarty to his Sherlock. That Waltz is playing Blofeld will come as a surprise to no one who’s even a casual Bond fan. But the film certainly wants it to. Hiding his identity, we initially know him as Franz Oberhauser. Franz is a brother of sorts to James Bond. After the death of Bond’s parents, Franz’s father looked after him, and Franz felt that James supplanted him in the eye of his dad. So he killed his father, faked his own death and took the name Blofeld.

Wait, there’s more…

“Spectre” retcons so many elements from the previous three films. As it turns out, Blofeld has been Bond’s puppet master for all his life. He’s responsible for everything that’s happened during Craig’s run. All those baddies worked for Spectre. In addition to making the universe that much smaller (even Auric Goldfinger avoided the mantle of Spectre), this is lazy, lazy, lazy writing. Instead of constructing a worthwhile villain or setting up the evil organization in the previous entries, the filmmakers trot out a fan favorite (with tired daddy issues to boot) and hang the plots of “Casino,” “Quantum” and “Skyfall” on him. He says to Bond at one point, “I’ve really put you through it all these years.” If you say so.

Without any emotional stakes or character investment, the back half of this film feels tedious. It dives head first into most of the Bond clichés the Craig movies have spent ribbing, but they feel half-assed, like the director’s heart isn’t in it. Bautista’s Mr. Hinx is a completely unremarkable henchman. He’s got metal thumbnails, a fact that I needed to be reminded of after my screening because they’re such a non-entity, which he uses to gouge out a foot soldier’s eyes. And he’s dead by the middle of the film. You remember Oddjob and Jaws. You remember their names. (I had to look Mr. Hinx up.) You remember their quirky character traits, Jaws for his nasty chompers and Oddjob for his lethal propensity for hat throwing.

Not once, but twice, this film falls into the elaborate scenarios that Bond always escapes from. The first is a torture scene with a series of small drills and James’s head. The second is an escape sequence. Blofeld sends Bond on a chase through the bombed out MI6 to find Madeleine. If he can’t find her in three minutes, they’ll both be killed when the building is completely leveled by another bomb. This sequence left me wanting to scream, “Just kill them!” Same old villain falling for the same old tricks.

As another friend of the blog, another Ben, put it, “I can see what they were trying to do. They wanted an updated version of the cheeky, kitschy fun of the late Connerys. Watches, quips, muscle men, countdowns. That could be fun in small doses. But to build an entire film on those references isn’t borrowing classic fun from the franchise’s past. It’s inviting back all the problems of banking on those references to captivate an audience, or even keep them vaguely involved.”

Is “Spectre” as bad as “Quantum of Solace?” Not quite. It’s got too much polish for that. But it was a lot easier to slap a tourniquet on “Quantum” and brush it off. This one, thanks to its ties to the other films, ain’t gonna be that easy. Stir it or shake it up, I hope the producers do whatever they need to right this ship.

Have you seen “Spectre?” What did you think? Let me know in the Comment section!

Review: “Sicario”

October 9, 2015October 9, 2015 Garrett Reviews Benicio del Toro, cinematography, Denis Villeneuve, Emily Blunt, filmmaking, Josh Brolin, movie review, review, Roger Deakins, Sicario, suspense, Taylor Sheridan, thriller

I’ve got it. The next big trend in physical fitness. All you need to do is watch Denis Villeneuve’s “Sicario,” once a day, every day, and the pounds will melt off in no time. From its opening moments, depicting a raid on a drug house, the film is sweaty-palms suspenseful.

FBI agent Kate Macer (Emily Blunt) is part of that raid. Soon after, she’s recruited into a task force, which includes Josh Brolin’s Matt Graver and Benicio del Toro’s Alejandro Gillick. They’re to take down a major drug kingpin in Mexico. Kate, unsure of whom to trust even on her own team, realizes she’s swimming in dark and dangerous waters.

The main cast — Blunt, del Toro and Brolin — are really strong. Brolin, with his wry smile and reluctance to give up information, generates a lot of nervous laughs. But del Toro is the MVP. In one of my favorite moments, shortly after we (and Kate) have met him, he’s sleeping on an airplane and his hand starts to twitch and then he wakes with a start. The smallest suggestion that under the enigmatic and menacing exterior, there’s a lot of pain and sadness.

Taylor Sheridan’s screenplay doesn’t provide Blunt’s Kate with a whole lot of background or even agency, but that’s why you cast one of the best actresses of her generation. In an early exchange, we learn that she’s divorced and doesn’t have kids. No family attachments. (How’s that for foreboding?) Throughout the film, she often finds herself on the losing end of conflicts, which is a little unusual for mainstream audiences. I didn’t mind it so much, as it felt emblematic of the drug war itself. It’s a losing battle.

The action setpieces have a real sense of presence. Explosions aren’t accompanied with the standard fireball. They’re concussive forces, throwing our heroes to the ground. Kevlar vests don’t keep characters free from harm. Bullets still knock the wind out of them, leaving them gasping for air. Interrogations aren’t performed with a lot of flapping and yelling but cold and quiet intimidation. I’ve never witnessed a real explosion, been shot at or interrogated — knock on wood — but these moments felt refreshingly absent any trumped up Hollywood conventions.

Indeed, the film achieves all this without resorting to cinema verite techniques (handheld camera, extensive film grain, etc.). I’ve talked about Cinematographer Roger Deakins on the blog before, and I can’t overstate his skill and artistry behind the camera. In what’s sure to be one of the shots of the year, a group of gunmen are preparing for a dangerous trek underground at sunset. As they move across the barren desert landscape, their silhouettes appear against the nearly-night sky and slowly sink into the dark horizon.

Deakins and Villeneuve employ a lot of helicopter shots, particularly as the task force is driving across the border into Mexico for a mission. Being a fan of “The Shining,” I couldn’t help but think of the opening moments of Stanley Kubrick’s film as Jack Torrance drives to the film’s haunted hotel. The effect here is similar, as we watch from on high as our characters navigate into trouble.

Due to its blistering intensity and pessimistic worldview, “Sicario” isn’t going to be a film for everyone. But if you’re willing to take the ride, I think the craftsmanship and strong performances are definitely worth your time.

Have you seen “Sicario?” What did you think? Comment below and thanks for reading!

Why CG Sucks (Because Sometimes It Does)

August 25, 2015August 25, 2015 Garrett Uncategorized Aliens, CG, CGI, Computer Generated Imagery, Digital Effects, directing, filmmaking, Forrest Gump, Freddie Wong, Monsters, practical effects, robots, Special Effects, Transformers, Visual Effects

Freddie Wong recently uploaded a video on why computer-generated imagery (or CG) sucks. “Except it doesn’t,” he qualifies. I’m a big fan of Wong’s work, most of which is available on YouTube. He’s a talented artist and entertainer, and he’s done a number of informative behind-the-scenes videos. His channel is a great resource for fledgling filmmakers.

The general thrust of his latest is summarized in an opening line: “I think the reason we think CG looks bad is because we only see bad CG.” He asserts that there’s a lot of great CG work that goes largely unnoticed, precisely because it’s so strong and seamless.

And while I agree with that, I think Wong brushes some significant negatives under the rug.

Something that can’t help but color the video is its intended audience. “Do your fingers rage across subreddits and message boards about a simpler, better time…back before computers ruined movies?” Wong’s audience is filmmakers and aficionados. Unless I’m grossly underestimating the general populace’s interest in CG, who else is bemoaning the loss of practical effects?

And many of his examples are minor touch ups. Note the snow on the ground in the shot with Daniel Craig and Rooney Mara. It’s a relatively still camera with limited movement in the frame — not a huge challenge to paint in effects. Or the stadium shot from “Forrest Gump.” The filmmakers hired enough extras to fill a section. What you’re seeing is a bunch of practical elements composited on a computer.

I think these two examples constitute good and, indeed, invisible uses of CG. Critically, they’re also limited. Computers were used to augment reality, not fabricate it whole cloth. To my mind, this is all those lamenting an overuse of digital effects are asking for — a little restraint.

Now, I don’t want to blanketly condemn computer-generated effects and certainly not the artists who create them. As Wong points out, it’s a segment of the industry that gets pummeled on a regular basis. And sometimes it can be hard for practical methods to achieve a desired effect. I’m a big fan of Japanese giant monsters, and those films are known for using men in suits and miniatures. That said, I appreciate that recent kaiju films, such as “Pacific Rim” and “Godzilla,” opted for CG instead. Rendering the physics of something that big (and the destruction it causes) can be difficult with a suit or even animatronics.

I’m for whatever looks best. Yes, sometimes costs are going to demand one approach over another, but having something physically on set is almost always going to trump the thing that gets added in post. Even if you as an audience member aren’t aware of what strategy is being used, I bet you’ll have a more visceral reaction to a practical effect than a digital one. After all, it’s not just you reacting to that robot, alien, dinosaur or what have you…it’s the actors. Imagine you’re a filmmaker, and you’re spending vast sums of money by the hour. You’re going to get better results a lot faster if your actors have something to act to.

Wong concludes:

“So maybe the reason why people seem to think visual effects are ruining movies isn’t really a problem with the visual effects, maybe it’s just a problem with the movies themselves…CG, just like every innovation in cinema, is simply a tool on the filmmaker’s tool belt to tell a story. But when the end result is bad, maybe it’s not the tool’s fault.”

Clearly CG is not a sentient being out to destroy movies. It’s still grossly misused. Wong cites practical elements in the “Transformers” movies and praises their digital effects work, but don’t get me started on the exaggerated and overcomplicated animation of its title characters. Is that the fault of the digital artists? Of course not! That was Michael Bay’s vision…one made possible by computer animation.

And that’s ultimately my point. Some filmmakers have become so enamored with being able to put anything and everything up on screen that they forget how it looks. CG’s become a crutch — one that fosters laziness and poor choices. The set pieces of many tentpole productions are established before there’s even a script so that digital artists can get to work (including “The Avengers,” which is cited in this very video). That’s backwards thinking, and it underscores the studios’ priorities when it comes to effects and story.

What are your thoughts on the film industry’s use of CG? Comment below!

My 40 Favorite Moments from “Jaws” (Part 2 of 2)

June 21, 2015June 21, 2015 Garrett Uncategorized adventure, anniversary, Brody, Carl Gottlieb, filmmaking, Great White, Hooper, horror, Jaws, John Williams, Peter Benchley, Quint, Richard Dreyfuss, Robert Shaw, Roy Scheider, shark, Steven Spielberg, suspense

Welcome back! If you missed the first part of my 40 favorite moments from “Jaws,” click here. Don’t forget to check out the film on the big screen this evening, courtesy of TCM and Fathom Events.

21.) Quint’s shark shack

Quint ribs Hooper about his city hands, and the Chief can’t stomach Quint’s homemade booze. The scene sets up a lot of the conflict to come. These characters and their dynamic are a real strength of the film. I could watch these guys on a road trip.

22.) “Farewell and adieu…”

Before setting out, Quint sings “Spanish Ladies.” (It’s catchy as hell!) I’ve always loved the smile Hooper gives him. I like to think it’s a rare moment of camaraderie between them, Hooper perhaps recognizing a song he’s heard on the ocean. But you could also read it as “Just nod and smile at the crazy loon.”

23.) Genre hop

An interesting things about “Jaws” is that it changes genres halfway through. It starts as a horror film — an unseen force preying on a white picket fence community — and then it becomes an adventure when our three heroes embark on a hunt for a killer shark.

24.) Drinking contest

One of the things that makes “Jaws” so special is its sense of humor. It leverages the suspense and excitement, and it comes naturally from its characters. Consider Quint and Hooper having a drink. Quint drains his beer can and crushes it, Hooper does just the same…except his is a Styrofoam cup.

25.) Air tank exposition

Hooper chews Brody out for sending air tanks across the Orca’s deck. It’s a great bit of exposition, because it accomplishes three things at once. (1) It ups the stakes and the possibility for disaster. (2) It reinforces that Brody is not at home on the water and isolates him from the other characters. (3) It sets up the shark’s final scene and the climax of the film.

26.) Whose [fishing] line is it anyway?

An attempt to capture the shark involves piano wire and a fishing rod. Brody and Hooper are busy, so only Quint notices that something seems to be nibbling on the end of his line. The sound work is fantastic, allowing tension to build. Click, click, click. The line twitches in the water. Creak. And Quint fastens himself to his chair.

27.) The shark is ready for its close-up

Martin: “I can go slow ahead. Come on down and chum some of this shit!”

And boom, more than an hour into the film, the Great White finally gets his close-up. Timed perfectly, I love the way Spielberg turns a laugh into a scream.

28.) Shark’s limited screen time

I adore the judicious use of the shark, a strategy that would surely fall flat today. (Remember all that bellyaching about Godzilla’s screen time in last year’s reboot?) Still, few things take the majesty and menace out of a monster like overexposure.

29.) “You’re gonna need a bigger boat.”

C’mon, what else do I need to say! The perfect encapsulation of an insurmountable problem.

30.) Pirate music

John Williams’s work highlights that transition from horror to sea-faring adventure. Nowhere is that more prevalent than the first chase. Listen to the track here. Still gets my heart racing.

31.) Fish stories

Quint and Hooper, a little tipsy, compare scars in a game of one-upsmanship. I got this from a bull shark. Well, I got this from a thresher. The Chief lifts his shirt, takes a look at his appendectomy scar, then quickly dismisses it. The scene’s a welcome reprieve after the first thrilling chase and before…

32.) “You were on the Indianapolis?”

I love the way Hooper’s laugh deflates when he learns that Quint was on the USS Indianapolis. It’s a great bit of acting by Dreyfuss. If you’re not familiar with the story — I certainly wasn’t as a kid — it lets you know that you’re in for something. Also note how Brody isn’t aware of the event. Yet again, he’s the outsider.

33.) The Indianapolis monologue

Robert Shaw delivers the movie monologue to end all movie monologues. The language is so evocative: “You know the thing about a shark, he’s got black eyes. Lifeless eyes, like a doll’s eyes. When he comes at ya, he doesn’t seem to be livin’…until he bites ya.” Whether a conscious choice or not — Shaw was a drinker on set — I love Quint’s drunken portrayal. As though his boat-mates wouldn’t be hearing this story if he were sober. It also serves as a basis for some of Quint’s more questionable decisions.

34.) The sound of silence

After conditioning the audience to expect the shark’s theme before an attack, Spielberg and Williams pull a great switcheroo. When the barrels attached to the fish surface, the audience knows the threat is there. Its attack comes out of silence.

35.) “He’s chasing us, I don’t believe it!”

I love the characterization – I’m using that word loosely — of the shark. He’s driven by more than just instinct, and, yes, there wouldn’t be much of a movie if he just moved on to another beach. He almost mocks our heroes before bringing his full strength to bear. The way he passes by Hooper in the cage before striking (more on that in a bit). And the way the tables turn and he starts chasing the Orca. The shark’s final scene is spectacular, but it’s earned. You feel as though that’s what it’d take, nothing less, to kill this unstoppable force.

36.) Life jackets

Quint tells Brody and Hooper that he’ll never put on a life jacket again. So when he hands each of them one, the boat hanging low in the water, it speaks volumes about their predicament. This is as close as Quint gets to apologizing. And I love the visual of him finding the life jackets: hanging from the ceiling, dripping with water.

37.) Cage match

With Hooper in the cage, we finally get our first full-body look at the Great White. It appears out of the din, Williams’s theme chugging along in the background. It glides by the cage, not even fitting inside the 2.35 framing. As it disappears into the murk again, the theme fades. So haunting!

38.) “The ocean turns red…”

A shark attack in all its grisly horror, Quint comes face-to-face with the thing he fears most. Shaw’s committed performance sells it and makes for one of the best movie deaths of all time. Oh man, and the foley work — the snap-crack when the shark bites into Quint’s leg. Ouch.

39.) The end

Martin: “I used to hate the water.”

Hooper: “I can’t imagine why.”

40.) Source of inspiration

Okay, not really a moment from “Jaws,” but I owe my love of movies to this film. I’ve told the story before, but when I was seven years old, I wanted to be a marine biologist. So my mother showed me “Jaws,” and I wanted to be a filmmaker. When you hear about all the production’s trials and tribulations — ballooning budgets and schedules, a malfunctioning shark, weather, location politics — it’s a marvel it got made at all and a testament to art coming from adversity. That the film turned out as well as it did, well, that’s just icing on the cake. Or chum in the water. I liked “Jaws” as a kid, but it took getting older to appreciate how good it is.

Thanks for reading! Do you have a favorite moment from “Jaws?” Comment below.

My 40 Favorite Moments from “Jaws” (Part 1 of 2)

June 20, 2015June 20, 2015 Garrett Uncategorized anniversary, Brody, Carl Gottlieb, filmmaking, Great White, Hooper, horror, Jaws, John Williams, Peter Benchley, Quint, Richard Dreyfuss, Robert Shaw, Roy Scheider, shark, Steven Spielberg, suspense

Today marks the 40^th anniversary of “Jaws.” Directed by Steven Spielberg, written by Carl Gottlieb and Peter Benchley, and starring Roy Scheider, Robert Shaw, Richard Dreyfuss. The film changed the course of Hollywood…and it changed the course of my life. Note the name of the blog. In honor of its big anniversary, part one of my 40 favorite moments from “Jaws.”

1.) Duuh dunnn…duuuuh duun…

“All this machine does is swim and eat and make little sharks.” What better way to characterize something so simple than with two notes? Once John Williams’s theme gets going, it does indeed sound like an engine. A big, unstoppable engine…with teeth.

2.) Peeping shark

Suspense builds as we watch an unsuspecting menu item, her feet dangling beneath the surface.

3.) The first bite is the deepest

The minimalist approach here was the way to go. There isn’t so much as a shadow or flick of a fin. Just violent jerking motions. Primal and visceral.

4.) Meeting Martin Brody

Martin: “How come the sun didn’t used to shine in here?”

Ellen: “We bought the house in the fall. This is summer.”

…

Ellen: “In Amity you say ‘yahd’.”

Martin: “[The kids] are in the yahd, not too fahr from the cahr. How’s that?”

Ellen: “Like you’re from New York.”

In a few quick lines, we learn so much about the Brody family and Martin in particular.

5.) The ferry long take

The mayor corners the chief for a meeting about tourist season. There’s minimal camera movement, but since we’re on a ferry, the background is spinning and Spielberg keeps the actors moving such that we don’t notice the long take. It’s a dynamic way to deliver exposition.

6.) Brody’s POV

Spielberg places us in the shoes of the paranoid chief as he watches bathers from his chair. Beach-goers walk in front of the camera — they wipe off Brody and wipe on what he’s looking at. Someone will be talking to the chief, their face wedged into the corner of the frame and an expanse of ocean over their shoulder, letting us know what’s really on our his mind.

7.) Let’s [not] paint the town red!

Red is used so sparingly in the film that when it does appear, it pops off the screen.

8.) There’s chaos in the air

“We have to talk to Mrs. Kintner, because this is going to turn into a contest.”

“I have a motel! How do you feel about this?”

“Go out there tomorrow and see that no one gets hurt!”

Overlapping dialog during the town meeting accomplishes so much more than a traditional, staged approach. It adds texture and makes Amity feel lived in.

9.) There ARE strings on me.

Brody, on the left side of the frame, talks about keeping the beaches safe. He has no lead room — no vision or conviction. Behind him, the mayor and his cronies watch their puppet dance. A whole story in one shot.

10.) Quint’s intro

Nails on a chalkboard rake across a shark that’s devouring a swimmer. And so we meet the film’s most indelible character. Quint’s entrance encompasses all the bluster that he’ll come to embody. And yet his line, “There’s too many captains on this island,” cuts right to the heart of the problem. Bureaucracy and commercial interests have indeed run amok on the island.

11.) Brody’s studies

Brody glances through a series of photographs depicting real-life shark attacks. Reflected in his glasses, the horror on the book pages consume his vision.

12.) Fickle fin

Martin: “I don’t want him on the ocean!”

Ellen: “He’s not on the ocean, he’s in a boat!”

Ellen: “Michael! Did you hear your father? Out of the water now. Now!”

13.) Attack of the Pier!

After a bounty is placed on the shark, two fishermen attempt to catch it. When the fish takes the bait chained to a pier, half the pier goes with it and one of the men gets dragged out to sea. In one of my favorite gags, the pier turns around and follows him. Shark-by-proxy, far spookier than actually seeing the creature.

14.) Brody and his son

Few and far between are the blockbusters that would make room for a scene like this. Having been blamed for the death of Alex Kintner, the chief finds himself goofing off with his son. The young boy mimics his father, and Martin plays along. It aligns us firmly with our hero.

15.) Ellen & Hooper

Ellen laughs just a little too hard and a little too long at some of Hooper’s jokes. It’s a nice bit of characterization and a nice nod to Peter Benchley’s novel, which contained a subplot about an affair between the two.

16.) “Drowning”

Ellen: “Martin sits in his car when we go on the ferry to the main land. I guess it’s a childhood thing. There’s a clinical name for it, isn’t there?”

Martin: “Drowning.”

You’ve got to love Schieder’s off-handed delivery. In a lesser film, Martin Brody would have been too broadly comic or just a wet blanket. But Spielberg and Scheider strike the right balance.

17.) Boo!

While we ponder Hooper’s discovery of a tooth the size of a shot glass — Bam! — a pale and bloated corpse floats out to greet him. Like a magician, Spielberg draws our gaze away before the trick.

18.) Water-level camera

One of the visual strategies Spielberg employs is a water-level camera. This usually involves water lapping over the lens and swimmers in the background. It amps up the tension as it feels like we, the audience, are treading shark-infested water.

19.) “Michael’s in the pond!”

After a false alarm on July 4th, a woman spots the shark. “There’s a shark in the pond!” The camera tracks with Brody in profile as he makes his way through a crowd, faster and faster until the beach goers are blurs around him. It’s a great means of visualizing the chief’s rising panic as his son happens to be playing in the pond.

20.) Mayor of Shark City

“I was acting in the town’s best interest.” Murray Hamilton says this to himself as much as Brody, as though he was already practicing for the media gauntlet. By the end of the scene, he’s just a broken man: “Martin, my kids were on that beach too.” It’s a glimmer of humanity in a character that’s otherwise pretty sleazy.

Tune in tomorrow for the second and final installment in “My 40 Favorite Moments from ‘Jaws’.” Also tomorrow, Fathom Events will also be screening the film throughout the country. If you’ve never seen “Jaws” on a big screen with a large audience, it’s a real treat! Click here for location and ticket details.

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