While there are very few movies that can be deemed as either sacred or untouchable in an era where every known brand is in a state of perpetual rebooting, Steven Spielberg’s Jaws is definitely among them.
One of the single most important and influential films ever made, the shark attack thriller gave birth to the summer blockbuster as we know it, revolutionized the way high-profile projects are marketed and released in theaters, and became the highest-grossing title in the history of cinema after raking in $472 million at the box office.
Oh, and it kept an entire generation of filmgoers out of the water, and launched the wildly popular subgenre of aquatic beasts hunting human chum that remains so popular today.
Jaws got three sequels, all of which were major downgrades that ranged from disappointing to abhorrent (although The Revenge did buy Michael Caine a nice house), but there is absolutely no need for a new version to even cross the mind of a studio executive. In fact, the mere suggestion of it being floated on two separate Reddit threads led to an outpouring of condemnation, and rightly so.
Looking at the facts and the current state of both A and B-tier cinema, there are more than enough shark attack flicks coming down the pipeline on an annual basis for Jaws to remain on its lofty pedestal indefinitely. Nobody’s going to come close to recapturing the magic of Spielberg’s classic, so what’s the point in even trying?
Despite what the industry wants us to believe, not everything has to be given a fresh coat of paint to appeal to the modern viewer, and Jaws is most certainly in that category.