Jaws 2

Jaws 2
Directed by	Jeannot Szwarc
Written by	Carl Gottlieb Howard Sackler Dorothy Tristan (uncredited)
Produced by	David Brown Richard D. Zanuck
Starring	Roy Scheider, Lorraine Gary, Murray Hamilton, Jeffrey Kramer
Cinematography	Michael Butler
Edited by	Neil Travis
Music by	John Williams
Distributed by	Universal
Release date	June 16 1978
Running time	116 min.
Language	English

Jaws 2 is a 1978 horror–thriller film directed by Jeannot Szwarc. It is the first sequel to Steven Spielberg's 1975 Oscar winning classic Jaws. Although there would be two further films in the series, Jaws 2 is generally regarded as the best of the sequels. Set four years after the events of the original film, another great white shark arrives on the shores of Amity Island. After a series of deaths and disappearances, police chief Martin Brody (Roy Scheider) suspects that the culprit is another shark. However, he has trouble convincing the town's selectmen. He has to act alone to save the group of teenagers, including his two sons, who meet the shark during a sailing expedition.

Like the first film, the production was troubled. The original director, John D. Hancock, proved to be unsuitable for an action film and was replaced by Szwarc. Scheider was also unhappy during production and had several heated exchanges with Szwarc.

The film's tagline, "Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water...", became one of the most famous in movie history and has been parodied and homaged several times.

Plot

Four years after the events of the first film, two divers discover the wreck of the Orca, Quint's boat. As they celebrate and take photographs, they are attacked and killed by a great white shark. One of the divers manages to take a couple of snaps as the shark approaches.

Police chief Martin Brody (Scheider) becomes suspicious with the disappearance of a skier (Christine Freeman) and the explosion of her boat, along with its driver (Jean Coulter), and the discovery of a beached Orca bearing large wounds that he guesses were caused by a shark.

Brody's suspicions are unwelcomed by the selectmen at a time when the town is enjoying a revival in its tourist industry. From atop a observation tower, he believes that he sees the shadow of a large shark approaching the bathers. He orders everyone out of the water, brandishing his gun, creating undue upset and panic since the shadow is a school of bluefish.

Later that night, he acquires prints from the diver's camera showing close-ups of the sharks' head. Brody's attempt to present this evidence of the shark's presence to the selectmen is hampered by the ambiguity of the photographs. Although Brody "knows what a shark looks like because [he's] seen one up close", developer Len Peterson (Joseph Mascolo) suggests that it could simply be "seaweed, [or] something in the lens." Angry with his performance on the beach, they vote to fire Brody from his job.

File:Jaws2 - teens.jpg

The stranded teens.

A group of teenagers, including Brody's two sons, Mike (Mark Gruner) and Sean (Marc Gilpin) and the mayor's son Larry (David Elliott), go on a sailing expedition. They soon encounter the shark, which disables most of their boats. A small rescue helicopter is dispatched to tow them, but the shark attacks that, overturning it and drowning the pilot (Jerry M. Baxter).

Brody arrives to save the stranded teens. He entices the shark to bite on a power cable, electrocuting it. Template:Endspoiler

Production history

The studio demanded a sequel early into the success of Jaws. Howard Sackler, who had contributed to the script of the original movie but chose not to be credited, was charged with writing the first draft. He originally proposed a prequel based on the sinking of the USS Indianapolis relayed by Quint in the first film. Sid Sheinberg, however, rejected the idea.

Steven Spielberg did not want to direct the sequel because he felt that he had done the "definitive shark movie." Sackler recommended theatre director John D. Hancock (who directed Let's Scare Jessica to Death), who was chosen to helm the picture. However, Sackler felt betrayed when Dorothy Tristan, Hancock's wife, was invited to rewrite his script.

Universal Studios President Sid Sheinberg suggested that his wife Lorraine Gary "should go out on a boat and help to rescue the kids". Dick Zanuck got wind of this and replied "Over my dead body". The next draft of the Jaws 2 screenplay was turned in with Gary not going out to sea.

Hancock was feeling the pressure of directing his first epic adventure film "with only three film credits, and all small-scale dramas." The producers were unhappy with his material, and on a Saturday evening in June 1977, after a meeting with the producers and Universal executives, the director was fired. He and his wife were unexpectedly whisked away to Rome and production was shut down for a few weeks. They had been involved in the film for eighteen months.

Echoing the production of the first film, Carl Gottlieb was enlisted to further revise the script, adding humor and reducing some of the violence. It cost the producers more money to hire Gottleib to do the rewrite than it would had they have hired him in the first place.

At this point, Spielberg considered returning to direct the sequel. Over the Bicentennial weekend Spielberg hammered out a screenplay based on Quint's "Indianapolis Story" speech. Because of his contract for Close Encounters of the Third Kind, however, he would not be able to film for a further year, a gap too long for the producers. Production Designer Joe Alves (who would direct Jaws 3-D) and Verna Fields (who had been promoted to vice-president at Universal after her acclaimed editing on the original film) proposed that they co-directed it. The request was declined by the DGA, partly because they would not allow a DGA member to be replaced by someone who wasn't one of its members, and partly because they, in the wake of events on the set of The Outlaw Josey Wales, had instituted a ban on any cast or crew members taking over as director during production of a film. The reins were eventually handed to Jeannot Szwarc, best known for the TV movie Bug and Night Gallery and whom Alves knew from the Night Gallery days.

Szwarc recommenced production by filming a complicated scene (the waterskier scene) which would give Gottlieb some time to write. He reinstated the character of Deputy Hendricks, played by Jeffrey Kramer, who had been missing from the original script. Many of the teenagers were sacked, with the remaining roles developed.

Three sharks were built for the film. The first was the "platform shark," also referred to as the "luxurious shark." Production designer Joe Alves and special mechanical effects designed Bob Mattey were able to use the same mold for the shark as for the original film. However, they had to redo the electronics as the originals had been left out on the lot. Mattey's design was much more complicated and ambitious than the original film. "Cable Junction", the island shown in the climax of the movie, was a floating barge that accommodated the mechanisms of the 'platform shark'. The other 'sharks' were a fin, and a full shark. Both could be pulled by boats.

Although the first film was commended for leaving the shark to the imagination until two thirds of the way through, Szwarc felt that they should show it as much as possible because the "first image of it coming out of the water" could never be repeated. Although critics complained that the additional screen time awarded to the shark makes it "seems far less terrifying than its almost mystical contemporary", Szwarc believed that the reduction of the first's Hitchcockian suspense was inevitable because the audience already knew what the shark looked like from the final third of the first film. reviewers have since commented that "there was no way that they were ever going to duplicate the effectiveness of the original." However, they gave it a more menacing look by scarring it in the early boat explosion.

Scheider's involvement

Roy Scheider reluctantly returned to reprise his role as Martin Brody. He had quit the role of 'Michael' in The Deer Hunter two weeks into the production because of "creative differences." Universal agreed to 'forget' about this if he appeared in Jaws 2, which they would count as the remaining two of his contractual obligations.

The atmosphere was tense on the set, and he often argued with Szwarc. The rift was articulated in written correspondence. In a letter to Szwarc, Scheider wrote that "working with Jeannot Szwarc is knowing he will never say he is sorry or ever admitting he overlooked something. Well enough of that shit for me!" He requested an apology from the director for not consulting him.

Szwarc's reply focussed upon completing the film to the "best possible" standard.

Time and pressure are part of my reality and priorities something I must deal with.
You have been consulted and your suggestions made part of my scenes many times, whenever they did not contradict the overall concept of the picture.
If you have to be offended, I deplore it, for no offense was meant. At this point in the game, your feelings or my feelings are immaterial and irrelevant , the picture is all that matters.
Sincerely, Jeannot

Location

Martha's Vineyard was again used as the location for the town scenes. Although some residents guarded their privacy, many islanders welcomed the money that the company was bringing. Shortly after the production arrived in June 1977, local newspaper the Grapevine wrote:

The Jaws people are back among us, more efficient, more organized and more moneyed. Gone are the happy-go-lucky days of the first Jaws, where the big trucks roved about the Island from day to day, always highly visible with miles of cables snaking here and there over roads and lawns. Gone are the acrimonious wrangles and Select persons over noise and zoning regulations and this and that. What is still here is money -- about $2 million of it.

Many residents enjoyed being cast as extras. Some people, however, were so rich that they did not need the money and refused to co-operate. Only one drugstore allowed its windows to be boarded up for the moody look that Hancock wanted. "Universal Go Home" T-shirts began appearing on the streets in mid-June.

The majority of filming was at Navarre Beach in Florida, because of the warm weather. Cable Junction Island was built on a barge so that the huge mechanism of the platform shark could go underneath close to, or even underneath, it. On one occasion the set broke loose from its anchorage and had to be rescued as it drifted towards Cuba.

Real hammerhead sharks circled the teen actors during the filming of one shot. However, because their fictional personas were meant to be in distress, the crew (filming from a distance) did not realize that the actors were genuinely calling for help.

The interior shots of the teen hang-out where they play pinball were filmed in the original location of the Hog's Breath Saloon on Okaloosa Island. This restaurant has recently relocated to Destin, Florida as its original building was susceptible to hurricane damage. The original building was still vacant and derelict in January 2005. The production company had to seek dredge and fill permits from the State of Florida's Department of Environmental Regulation to sink the revised platform that controlled the shark on the sea bottom.

Music

John Williams returned to score Jaws 2 after winning an Academy Award for Original Music Score for his work on the first film. Szwarc said that the music for the sequel should be "more complex because it was a more complex film." Williams says that this score is broader, allowing him to make more use of the orchestra, and use longer notes, and "fill the space" created by the director.

Critics have praised Williams' score, comparing it favorably to the original. Williams "uses a few basic elements of the original - the obligatory shark motif, for one - and takes the music off in some new and interesting directions." The score is "more disturbing in places" that the original, and "Williams fashion some new and hugely memorable out to sea adventure music." Because Jaws 2 "isn't a film that requires subtlety... Williams pulls out all the stops to make it as exciting and hair raising as possible."

According to the liner notes, Williams' "sense of the dramatic, coupled with his exquisite musical taste and knowledge of the orchestra definitely stamp this score as truly one of his best." It is "brilliantly performed by a mini-symphony made up of the finest instrumentalists to be found anywhere."

Due to time constraints, the film had not been completed when Williams began working on the score, "enabling him to create themes based on ideas and suggestions, rather than a locked down print." Although Mike Beek makes positive comments about the film, he says that "the music certainly elevates it to a level it would otherwise never have achieved."

Reaction

File:Jaws 2 teaser.jpg

The teaser poster for Jaws 2, bearing the famous tagline.

Box office performance

According to David Brown, the film made 40% of the original. This was attractive to studios because it reduced risk. The film was the highest-grossing sequel in history in 1978 and an all-time top 25 box office champ for more than two decades.

It opened in 640 theaters, making $9,866,023 in its opening weekend.

Critical reception

Although the film was initially met with mixed reviews, most critics agree that this is the best of the Jaws sequels. DVD Authority says "After this one, the other Jaws movies seemed to just not be as good. I seem to recall "Jaws 3" in 3-D. Wow. But Jaws 2, I felt, was a worthy sequel, even if topping the original was next to impossible."

One review says: "it's obviously not a patch on Spielberg's classic, but it's about as good as could be hoped for, with some excellent sequences, almost worthy of the original, several genuine shocks, a different enough story and some pretty decent characters." The performances of Scheider, Gary and Hamilton are particularly praised. The absences of Richard Dreyfuss and Robert Shaw are lamented, especially since the teenage characters are labeled "largely annoying 'Afterschool Special' archetypes" who are "irritating and incessantly screaming" and "don't make for very sympathetic victims".

Because of its emphasis upon the teenage cast some critics have compared the film to the slasher films that were rising in popularity at that time.

Cultural impact

The film's tagline, "Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water...", has become one of the most famous in film history. Andrew J. Kuehn, who developed the trailer for the original Jaws, is credited with coining the phrase. It has been parodied in numerous films; the most notable being the one for the 1996 feature film adaptation of the television series, Flipper, "This summer it's finally safe to go back in the water."

DVD release

The film was released on DVD in 2001 and was praised for the quantity of special features, with "more than a lot of titles labeled as "Special Edition" discs." It includes a 45 minute documentary produced by Laurent Bouzereau, who is responsible for many of the documentaries about Universal films. Actor Keith Gordon reminisces in a short feature, and Szwarc explains the phonetic problems with its French title (Les Dents de la mer 2).

The disc also contains a variety of deleted scenes. One such scene shows the selectmen voting to fire Brody. The Mayor (Murray Hamilton) is the only person to vote to save him. Also included is footage of the shark attacking the helicopter and its pilot after it had capsized. The scene was cut because of the struggle with the ratings board to acquire a PG certificate.

Although the audio was presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 mono, "Williams' score often sounds deceptively stereophonic" but "really demands the added bass that a 5.1 effort could have lent it."

References

• Loynd, Ray (1978) The Jaws 2 Log. London: W.H. Allen. ISBN 0-426-18868-3