Ivan Radford | On 10, Aug 2025

Director: Laurent Bouzereau
Cast: Steven Spielberg, John Williams George Lucas, JJ Abrams
Certificate: 15

What is there to say about the movie Jaws that hasn’t already been said? Laurent Bouzereau’s documentary about the film, its legacy and its troubled production is a good place to start.

50 years on from the OG summer blockbuster’s release, Steven Spielberg’s shark-infested thriller is still sending waves of influence through cinema. The film underscores that through the sheer range of big names queuing round the block to pay tribute to it – from James Cameron and JJ Abrams to Guillermo del Toro and George Lucas. Bouzereau has experience with both making-ofs and Disney, having previously made the heartfelt Music by John Williams, and there’s a similar feeling intimacy and warmth here.

Beyond fandom, though, there’s appreciation and understanding of craft in an accessible format, and the film’s strength is the way it takes us from sitting in the audience to behind the scenes without getting too technical, too dry or too hagiographic. It helps that the film was a famously troubled production, with almost everything that could go wrong veering off track.

The challenge facing this documentary is that almost all these teething problems are already know by cinephiles, from the fact that the mechanical shark (“Bruce”) they constructed didn’t work – because it was designed for fresh water rather than salt water – to the squabbling amount the cast members. The advantage the documentary has, though, is that so much time has passed that people are more open about those problems. And so we get the ins and outs of how Roy Scheider, Richard Dreyfuss and Robert Shaw disagreed, how that tension drew out such iconic performances – something that’s smartly informed through clips used from previous documentaries.

Bouzereau’s eye for detail drills down into extras and crew members, as well the more expected composition by John Williams of those spine-tingling two notes. But it’s Spielberg himself who emerges as the most surprising and candid interviewee. We hear about his emotional rollercoaster of a journey through the hype, popularity and possible awards success of the film – including being on camera as he was snubbed when the Oscar nominations were announced – but we also hear about his PTSD that came years after, and how he dealt with it. It’s a moving, honest moment that reminds us of the humans involved behind the headlines and movie legends.

What is there to say about the movie Jaws that hasn’t already been said? With personal insights amid a comprehensive and slickly edited collection of familiar film trivia, Jaws @ 50: The Definitive Inside Story more than lives up to its title.

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