By Todd Garbarini
All good things come to those who
wait. That being said the reason why
Blu-ray was invented is finally here. Steven
Spielberg's Jaws, arguably the first
and the greatest summer movie ever made, in addition to being one of the best
American films of all-time, has been given a complete digital 4K restoration
derived from the original camera negative. The results are magnificent. A far cry
from the MCA DiscoVision laser disc, the Capacitance Electronic Disc (CED) by
RCA, the VHS tape, the 20th anniversary letterboxed laser disc, or even the
past two previous DVD incarnations (which were admittedly pretty decent), the
new Blu-ray most closely approximates what it was like to see Jaws for the first time in movie
theaters in the summer of 1975. Best of
all, the Blu-ray cover retains artist Roger Kastel’s iconic poster art.
The plot of Jaws by now is so familiar that I do not feel it warrants a
summary. Jaws is a nearly perfect
film, held together by three fine lead performances by Roy Scheider, Richard
Dreyfuss, and Robert Shaw. At times humorous, playful, thrilling, terrifying,
and wildly adventurous, Jaws is one
of the best-edited motion pictures ever made. Verna Fields won a well-deserved
Oscar for fashioning a masterpiece out of all the raw footage brought to her by
Mr. Spielberg. Each subsequent viewing of Jaws
tends to reveal something new. The mafia angle which was prevalent in the novel
is somewhat alluded to in the one brief scene where Chief Brody (Roy Scheider)
is cautioned by Larry Vaughn (Murray Hamilton) to keep the beaches open, and
that the Island needs summer dollars. This
verbal strong-arming calls to mind Tony Soprano. This conversation speaks
volumes about corporations putting stockholders interests ahead of the safety
of their workers, a comparison that can be drawn to Ridley Scott's Alien (1979) if one cares to delve into it.
Watching the film again makes one
realize just how powerful the bond is between Mr. Spielberg and John Williams, the
composer on nearly all of Mr. Spielberg’s work for the past 40 years. Equally, Jaws
is possibly the first film to have terrific and memorable one-liners that have
made their way to the American lexicon. Chief Brody, the fish out of water from
New York City who is also deathly afraid of the ocean, in the end prevails
against all odds and could quite possibly take the credit for being the model
of all of those horror film heroes that were to follow in the footsteps of Jaws. (i.e either one man or one woman
is left standing after their comrades have been massacred.) The ending is also
a metaphor for the success of the film itself, wherein one issue after another
befell this production which lasted for nearly one year. Jaws is not only grand entertainment, but the film stands as an
example of how triumph in the face of adversity can be attributed to good old
fashioned brainpower and problem-solving.
While it is understandable to groan
about double and triple dipping when it comes to movies being reissued on home video
formats, the new Blu-ray of Jaws is a
must buy. With the exception of the beautiful
60-page booklet that accompanied the 2005 DVD (hold on to that!), the Blu-ray retains
all of the previous DVD extras:
- The Making of Jaws – Laurent Bouzereau’s excellent two-hour
documentary on the making of the film which originally appeared on the 1995
laserdisc box set
- Deleted
scenes and outtakes
- From the Set – a report from the set of the film
- Production
photos, storyboards, marketing Jaws
and the Jaws phenomenon
- Original
theatrical trailer
In addition to these extras, the
Blu-ray sports the inclusion of the long-desired documentary about the Jaws phenomenon entitled The Shark is Still Working: The Impact and
Legacy of Jaws directed by Erik Hollander and produced by Mr. Hollander,
James Galete, Jack Grove, and J. Michael Roddy. The film runs 101 minutes.
Jaws also includes an all-new 7.1 audio
soundtrack, in addition to Spanish and French audio. Subtitles are provided in English SDH, Spanish
and French.
A standard definition DVD is also
provided and it contains the restored film, in addition to a 50-minute version
of the aforementioned documentary by Laurent Bouzereau. The inclusion of this disc and the truncated
documentary is questionable given Jaws’s
release on DVD in 2000 and 2005. I would
have liked to have seen a double Blu-ray set with even more extras. If someone doesn’t have a Blu-ray player by
now, Jaws is the reason to get
one. This minor carping aside, I am
grateful to finally have one of my favorite films in this format.
Lastly, let’s all be thankful that the
shark didn't work most of the time!
CLICK HERE TO ORDER THE JAWS BLU-RAY + DVD + ULTRAVIOLET INSTANT STREAM + DIGITAL COPY FROM
AMAZON.COM
CLICK
HERE
FOR MY REVIEW OF JAWS: MEMORIES FROM MARTHA’S VINEYARD AND INTERVIEWS WITH THE
BOOK’S AUTHORS.