John Williams

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

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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.”

Farewell and adieu

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.

Drinking contest 1

Drinking contest 2

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.

Fishing line

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.

Shark's close up

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.

Indianapolis

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.

Life jackets

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!

Cage match

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.

Ocean turns red

39.) The end

Martin:  “I used to hate the water.”

Hooper:  “I can’t imagine why.”

The end

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.

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

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Today marks the 40th 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.

Peeping Shark

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.

First bite

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.

ferry

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.

Brody POV

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.

Paint the town red

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.

Puppet dance

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.

Quint intro

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.

Brody studies

12.) Fickle fin

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

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

Fickle fin pt 1

Fickle fin pt 2

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.

Brody and his son

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.

Boo

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.

Water-level camera

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.

Remember Your First Time?

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Matt Zoller Seitz recently published an excellent article about watching “Aliens” with his 11-year old son and a handful of his fifth grade friends.  He wrote, “I realized…that while unfortunately you can’t see a great movie again for the first time, the next best thing is to show it to people who’ve never seen it.”  Which is a sentiment I’ve always found to be true.  Watch a comedy you enjoy with someone who’s never seen it, and you’ll find yourself laughing harder.  Watch one of your favorite horror films with someone who’s never seen it, and you you’ll find your palms sweating.  In honor of Seitz’s writeup, I thought I’d share my experience showing “Jaws” to my college roommate.

Indeed, my freshman year roommate — and we would remain roomies throughout college — had never seen “Jaws.”  I felt determined and obligated to remedy this as quickly as possible.  He was a good sport, but he went into the experience with notions of what he thought the film would be.  Though he didn’t say anything beforehand, I could read it on him.  “Oh yeah, ‘Jaws?’  I’ve heard about the robotic shark.”  Or “I’ve seen other movies from this period, and I didn’t like them very much.”  Or “Horror movies have changed so much since the 70s.  Scary?  Yeah, we’ll see.”

One early autumn evening, we had three or four friends over to watch the film.  The viewing circumstances were less than ideal.  We were all stuffed into a small dorm room.  It was stinkin’ hot in upstate New York, and our door was open for circulation.  I still remember intoxicated voices bouncing around the hall outside as students were enjoying their weekend.  The television set was in the neighborhood of 15 inches, and it was wedged between the ceiling and the top of some large cabinets.  (They’re called “closets” in some circles.)

There was idle chit-chat among our friends over the opening credits.  I grimaced, not wanting to be a killjoy but also trying to maintain some semblance of a proper presentation.  With that first tug on poor Chrissie Watkins’s leg, things started to quiet down.  As she was ripped through the water by an unseen menace, the chatter completely turned to silence.

jaws-chrissie-smaller

Cut to 15 minutes later, Chief Brody sits on the beach with his family.  He anxiously watches bathers enter and exit the water, believing a shark was responsible for the young woman’s death.  A couple townsfolk strike up a conversation with him, but his eyes are fixed on the expanse of ocean.  The Chief explodes out of his chair at the sound of a young woman’s screams, only to discover that her boyfriend has surfaced beneath her.  He leans forward as a shape approaches a woman floating on her back.  It’s just a swimmer.  Little Alex Kitner enters the water and paddles out on his raft.  I watched with anticipation as John Williams’s menacing score started to thump and Spielberg’s roving camera — the shark’s POV — approached the boy from below.  The raft is overturned, and there’s a geyser of blood as Alex is taken under.

kitner

My roommate screamed:  “Oh God!  OH MY GOD!”

brody reacts

Movie viewings are rarely this gratifying.

As the full gravity of the community’s situation sets in, marine biologist Matt Hooper investigates a boat that was struck by the shark.  A moody night-time scene: lights from Hooper’s vessel filter through the inky water.  Eerie music indicates that danger could strike at any moment.  And then, my phone went off.  I can’t for the life of me remember why I didn’t have it on vibrate.  As it rang out, one of our friends piped up, “Well, that ruined the mood!”  Without bringing the phone to my ear, I spoke into the receiver: “Hold on.”  As Hooper approaches a hole in the hull of the boat, the craft’s former owner, dead, floats into frame to greet him.  Screams erupted all around me as I walked to the hallway to take the call.

boat scare

Afterward, my roommate would admit that he thought the film would be a victim of its times.  The next day, he posted a picture of the “Jaws” DVD online and simply stated: Best.  Movie.  Ever.

Do you have a memory of sharing a favorite film with a friend?  Comment below!

The Force Awakens

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Unless you were vacationing on a swamp in Dagobah over Thanksgiving, you probably know that the teaser for “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” landed.

I’ve been a fan of the franchise since early 1997.  That’s right, my first exposure to the galaxy far, far away was the theatrical release of the Special Editions.  (I promptly purchased the original trilogy on VHS, so I have seen it unaltered.)  When I say “first exposure,” I mean I knew nothing about George Lucas’s universe.  I’d seen a picture of Darth Vader somewhere, and having been a fan of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I assumed he was some sort of futuristic depiction of Shredder.

Darth-Vader_smaller Shredder_movie

I remember going to “Star Wars” with a friend, not entirely certain what I was seeing.  Is this a sequel?  A remake?  The effects looked modern, but the haircuts did not.  Like much of my generation…and previous generations…and generations since…I was excited by the expansiveness of the world, the memorable characters and the simple yet resonant themes.

But I’ve got no love for the prequels.  (Controversial, I know.)  I find them dramatically inert, despite material that’s actually pretty compelling.  I’m often drawn to stories about good people going bad.  Paging “The Godfather” and “Breaking Bad.”  The prequels also look very…plastic.  I watched the original “Star Wars” prior to the teaser release, and a couple days later, I watched the duel between Anakin and Obi-Wan in “Revenge of the Sith.”  The attack on the Death Star is still exceptional, with just a couple inserts that don’t hold up.  The duel, on the other hand, is only a few pixels shy of a video game.  Stunning when you consider the nearly 30 year difference, the larger budget for “Sith”, and that the Death Star sequence is more complex.

One of the things I appreciate most about the teaser is that it looks to return to the “lived in” science fiction universe that “Star Wars” popularized in the first place.  There are some great tactile details, like the water vapor surrounding the X-Wings as they roar across a lake.  The locations feel real, like the snowy forest featuring what might be the film’s antagonist.

x wings smaller sith-smaller

Admittedly, the teaser is scratching some nostalgic itches.  Stormtroopers?  Check.  Lightsaber?  Check.  Millennium Falcon and John Williams’s fanfare?  Double check!  I don’t imagine it’ll sway anyone who’s altogether disinterested.  Then again, these films are so steeped in our culture, it’s one of a few franchises — maybe the only one? — that probably doesn’t need to worry about educating the masses.

Within the signposts, there are some interesting twists.  I especially like the first image:  an empty desert expanse, then actor John Boyega pops into frame in what seems to be a nod to Sergio Leone’s “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.”  Dressed in a Stormtrooper outfit, he’s clearly concerned.  Whoa, a Stormtrooper!  Is he our main character?  And how great is it to see a person of color featured prominently in the first trailer for what will likely be the biggest movie of 2015!

boyega smaller

Then there’s the lightsaber hilt (pictured above), which has caused an uproar in parts of the fan community.  C’mon!  Technology in Star Wars has only ever been functional insofar as it looks used.  These films are as soft as science fiction gets — more fantasy, really — and everything is designed toward that aesthetic.

Where’s the practicality in having a cockpit inside a glass bubble that hangs off the side of a spacecraft?

falcon

And what’s logical about invading a snow planet with large walkers that can sink or, ya know, trip?

23-imperial-walker-atat-fall-destroyed-falls-battle-of-hoth

Besides, how many hands would a hilted lightsaber save?

Lukenohand

Finally, there’s the voice-over, delivered by Andy Serkis.  He describes an awakening in the Force, both the Dark Side and the Light.  What the hell happened?  What does it mean for Luke?  Have his powers been dormant?  The desert location featured in the teaser looks like Tatooine.  Did Luke seclude himself there like Obi-Wan?  I also thought it was pretty cool that they didn’t feature Mark Hamill or any of the original cast members.  No doubt they’ll show up in the first full trailer, but for now, the marketing is focused on new characters.

Given the prequels, I was pretty skeptical about another run of Star Wars movies, but Disney and Lucasfilm have gone a long way in reigniting my excitement.  J.J. Abrams is a solid if safe choice to direct Episode VII.  And I’m a big fan of writer-director Rian Johnson (“Brick,” “Looper”), so I’ll be excited to see where he takes Episode VIII and IX.  Of course there’s Gareth Edwards, director of this year’s “Godzilla,” currently working on the first spin-off.  And they’ve assembled a great group of performers for this first film.  I’ve mentioned Boyega, Serkis and the original cast, but there’s also Max Von Sydow, Adam Driver, Oscar Isaacs and Lupita Nyong’o.  With the strength of the teaser and the franchise’s new pedigree, the Force may have indeed awakened.