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How Steven Spielberg’s ‘Jaws’ Endured a Hellish Production to Become Hollywood’s First Summer Blockbuster
Steven Spielberg's 'Jaws' helped create the summer blockbuster and changed Hollywood with its innovative marketing campaign.
The first part of “Jaws” follows ineffectual police chief Brody (Roy Scheider) as he tries and largely fails to resist political pressure from the mayor (Murray Hamilton) to keep the beaches open, even as the body count rises. What resonates most strongly is the film’s subtler or more emotional moments — the camera lingering on a man left holding a stick after his dog fails to come back from a swim or the scene where Brody’s son mimics his depressed father’s body language at the dinner table. As for the director, he would move beyond his populist roots to examine bleak moments in history with his masterworks “Schindler’s List” and “Saving Private Ryan.” As an artist, Spielberg kept stretching, telling bolder and more challenging stories — as long as they took place on land.
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