Since the boy is drunk and probably stoned he cant keep up with the girl and passes out on the beach, the girl then jumps in the sea- without him .She swims away and you can slowly here the music build up and you can see the view from the sharks watching her under the water, by then the music is getting louder and louder (theme tune) therefore the audience know something bad is going to happen to the girl and they all know she’s probably going tot die .of course the girl doesn’t expect the attack and once the shark attacks the music is very loud and tense . the girl tries to escape and holds on to a bell floating but the strength of the shark is too strong and she is taken underwater. As soon as she goes under water everything goes silent except one thing –The bell. .A ringing bell usually represents death. Also the fact that after the attack its completely silent sets high tension because it makes you fill like the attack is really sudden and that he leaves like he arrived –fast.
In the title sequence we see the shark swimming in the water and we can hear the “Jaws” theme tune in the background .It makes the audience know somehow that whenever that music starts someone will be attacked and that created tension because the audience knows what’s happening but the victim doesn’t…
The jaws theme tune is always played when we see the shark’s point of view in the water.
All through the movie the director uses many different camera angles and to give different effects for example in the second attack (quick recap of the second attack. Brody is worried because he knows something is going to happen. A little kid goes into the water with a yellow Lillo, a teenager is throwing a stick into the water for his dog to go and fetch. Teenager looses his dog which is in fact eaten by the shark. Boy gets attacked, massive panic on the beach, the boy Lillo is thrown on the beach by the waves half eaten …) the director uses those techniques to build tension in the audience. At the start of the scene the director uses lots of close up and over the shoulder angle .first off he uses a lot of close-up so you can see the characters face especially Brody’s face because he wants the audience to see how tense he is because he knows something bad is going to happen and so do the audience. He also uses over the shoulder camera angle so when a character talk to another character the audience can see what’s happening behind, in this case its Brody watching the sea and the director uses that to his advantage to create a roller coaster of emotion by creating some short burst of tension ( the 2 main examples are the bit were the old man swims with his swimming hat one towards that fat floating woman and the bit were that young woman screams not because she’s being attacked but because she’s being picked up by her boyfriend ) .In this scene I think the most effective shot/camera angle is the one in the water from the sharks point for view because you can see all the targets he could attack and you think he could of pick any of those but he picked the character that you see earlier in the scene arguing with his mother saying he wants to in for longer but she doesn’t want to but eventually she let him go in the water( kids listen to you mothers),the shot used in that scene is a low angle shot which goes up towards the victim and that is quite effective for the audience because they know what’s happening but the victim doesn’t .If you look at details you will realised throughout the movie that the director has set lots of details. The biggest one( for me) is the scene of the second attack and if you look closely you will realised that everyone that is a victim in that scene wears yellow, for e.g. the kid that gets attack went out in the sea with a yellow Lillo, the mother of the boy that gets attacked wear a yellow hat, and the boy that looses his dog wear a yellow tee-shirt… one little detail that was drown to my attention was that at the end of the attack when everything went silent the boy’s Lillo lands on the beach half eaten . its like the shark was taunting them in a patronising way ,it was like the shark was saying “ thank you, but I don’t need that” and I think that was one of the most effective bit of the second attack .
In the all film the director had built a constant build up of fear towards the shark. I think there are two main reasons why the shark is made out to be so scary the first one is the music. The music is definitely one of the key factors of why the shark is so scary and that’s because the music itself is quite scary and give you this sense and because we associate the shark with the music we think automatically think of the shark as some one big mean killing machine. The second one is the fact that we don’t actually see the shark until the end of the movie but everyone know its huge because of all the details like massive bite chunks but no one know precisely how big which is quite scary because you don’t know what your facing .Also I think that the fact is that the shark is attacking innocent people makes him out to be some kind of menace that’s just attacks for the fun and not because he needs food , for example a shark usually tries to eat as much as possible of his victims but in the first attack he just took a chunk out of the girls leg and didn’t eat the rest of the body. There is one thing that makes the audience hate the shark even more and that’s the fact that he attacks for the third time on the 4th of July -Independence Day. One of America‘s most important day and that means that by trying to ruin that important day he’s attacking America itself making him a public enemy ! also the fact that on that day Brody’s son gets attack and that bring a sympathy towards the Brody’s family because he’s the hero but even more hatred towards the shark.
i think that the plot of the movie is quite good since its not boring and very tense ,in other word it keeps the audience on the edge of their seat the all way threw the movie .Even at the end it doesn’t loose its tension .in my opinion I think that the end is the most tense bit of the movie because its bit were the fight against the shark and they only won by a little bit . I think that the tensest moment at the end is when the Hooper the oceanographer in a desperate action goes into the cage and tries to kill the shark with a syringe but he accidently drops it. At the moment your thinking what are they going to do? How are they going to kill that monster ? but the Brody there to save the day and blows it up.
For me one of the most important moment of the film is the end bit were Quint get devoured by the shark and if you listen carefully it’s the only bit were the director didn’t use any music in the scene ( like the terrifying scenes in “Jurassic park” and “Save private Ryan”)and that makes it one of the most important scenes because the music isn’t there even though its never been more present before . Maybe the director didn’t put any music because he wanted a more emotional death, a silent one…
Emrick Michelet
