"The Flaws That Made Jaws"

Steven Spielberg?! Does That Ring A Bell? Maybe? Think 127 Film Awards Including 3 Oscars And Another 82 Nominations A Top His Producing, Directing and Writing Career In The World Of Popular Cinema! In 1975, Steven Spielberg took to his 3rd feature film entitled Jaw, which later came brought fear to people of all ages around America and beyond. It exposed the fear of sharks and the fear of the unknown and that which you cannot see. It is known still as the "Father Of Summer Blockbusters" and one of the first "high concept" films. But One thing that isn't known to most is "Jaws" was supposed to feature the shark in the majority of the terror scenes. Let's elaborate...

In May 1974 , Spielberg came up with the idea of a 25ft shark terrorizing the waters of Amity and in doing he wanted to do what has never been done before. He built a 25ft shark, named Bruce after his lawyer, made of electrical circuits. After a few months they tested the shark in fresh water tanks and he seemed to be working out perfectly. When filming came along they put Bruce, the shark, in the water and shortly after his electrical system blew out and Bruce was no longer usable. This was a devastating blow the Spielberg because the shark was essentially the movie and without him Spielberg felt it wouldn't be the same movie. So they went back to the drawing board and built 3 new sharks using pneumatically-powered props which are basically air powered blows to controlled the shark by at least 10 people in the case. The stomach of the shark was hollow so the pneumatic circuit could be placed. (See Pics Below)




Unfortunately Each Day Some part of the shark would break and would need many hours to fix and they lost valuable filming time. So as time went on the shark slowly started to break down and became extremely slow to a point were the shark was no longer a factor in the movie. Also photos of "Bruce" were leaked to time magazine making the fear of the entire movie lose its effect. Who would want to see a movie with a fake shark? Spielberg had to scratch his entire concept of having a visual of the actual shark other than what they shot already and think of another fright factor. Spielberg at this point thought "What would Alfred Hitchcock do? He though and come to the conclusion of implying the shark was there and film from the sharks point of view. He used shots primary made up of the actors chest up creating that fear of the unknown and not seeing your feet and wondering if anything is down there. So without using the shark Spielberg completely flipped his original concept and still made one of the most celebrated films in history.

If you really think about the fact that the shark did not work essentially gave Spielberg the edge he need to make his film and truly became a landmark in movies. Thankful the shark didn't work and we now are left with one of the greatest Steven Spielberg films ever made! Even without technology Spielberg was able to use the creativity of the audience to make the film and in this case was a huge success!



Interesting Fact About Jaws, The Open Scene Featuring Susan Backlinie was a scene that required little acting. During this scene Susan Backlinie was being tethered by two men under water to give the appearance of being attacked by a shark. In the scene she is screaming in pain because the shark is eating her but in reality while the men were tugging her she was breaking her ribs because the extent of the tugging. She is really screaming in pain because her ribs are breaking and not really because the "shark" is eating her. No Acting All Pain!