Would you consider Jaws a little too slow?

I like Saw, I do, I never didn't like Saw.
But to compare it to Jaws in any way or even think that their clearly separate leagues could be close enough that they could be compared... no sir. Nope.

Of course the movie isn't about hunting a shark. I think all of the discussion here makes it clear that absolutely no one said or even thought that, so I feel your snark is obviously misplaced. You Moby Dick parallel was obvious when I was in high school and I suspect that's true for everyone here.
But Brody is clearly, obviously, who the film thinks is a real man, with Hooper being second and Quint actually being dead-last. That is not necessarily the point of the movie, because I don't think this maleness narrative is the central thesis of the film by any stretch, but the film is very clear that Quint is a stupid ******* who nearly gets everyone killed, Hooper is a helpful and decent man, but Brody is actually the ideal.
For further example, in Moby Dick, Captain Ahab is the stupid ******* who nearly gets everybody killed and that is why he dies.

Oh, but it's also about hunting a shark.

Hooper's got some arrogance to overcome as well.


Brody is the Goldilocks Masculine, vulnerable but not soft, stoic but not strict.

I'd never really thought about Jaws as being any kind of statement or exploration of masculinity. (Again, I find the most interesting aspect of it the action-vs-inaction stuff). It's always interesting when people think a film is about being a "real" man or woman just how they interpret what the film is trying to say.

In any event, it is interesting to note that Brody is the only one of the three men who has a family, friends, and, you know, anyone who would be sad if they were eaten by a shark.

Well, this is in response to someone asserting that it was all about that and I'm saying if that's in the movie, Quint is not the best man, not by a long sight. But Brody is kind of a paladin and is really the guy

Yeah sorry, but I'm tired of the lies about my position on the moon landing. I suspect it didn't happen as reported, which shouldn't be too much of a damn leap when we're talking about the government.



As for Brody being a real man, I don't see it. He's a nothing burger. Quint is the guy who served on the Indiannapolis and dealt with the sharks. Brody has done nothing, and when the SHTF, Hooper dove to the bottom and stayed there.

Oh, I'm not saying it's right or wrong to think of masculinity as a theme (especially in a film that largely centers on three men in a boat), but that it's interesting in such a situation to see who people say is the one they think is meant to be considered "the best".

I just rewatched Quint's monologue to make sure I wasn't missing anything. In what way is Quint bobbing around in the water until he was rescued by a plane in any way braver or more "manly" than Hooper going into the water with a killer great white and then hiding to avoid being eaten? What masculine qualities are apparent in Quint's story--a story in which he and a bunch of other sailors huddled together in a group, screamed and made noise when a shark came close, were repeatedly traumatized by the deaths of the men around them, and then were pulled out of the water by rescuers? And by contrast, what "manly" action was Hooper supposed to take once he was out of the cage and had lost his only weapon? How has one of these men "dealt with" sharks but the other hasn't?

The need to have a singular definition of manhood just hamstrings, in my opinion, the ability to think about what the film is saying by contrasting these different men. Both Brody and Quint are facing up to a personal fear in pursuing the shark. Brody does so out of a sense of duty and protection, while Quint does so out of a sort of weird, almost self-destructive impulse. One of the most important moments of the film--Quint smashing the radio so that the men can't get help--is a borderline villainous moment. He's got tunnel vision because of his personal obsession.

I don't know anything about you and the moon landing, believe what you want.

Brody is the clear hero of the film and the one who not only saves himself, which Quint can't, but saves everyone else as well, risking his life and the well-being of his family to do so.
That's a man.
Hooper is actually the first to truly risk his life to kill the shark. First of all, getting on that boat took a lot of balls given HE knew what they were up against (unlike all the idiots who got in their boats and tried their hands at "shark hunter"). Then he has to endure Quint's narcissism and douchebaggery the whole time, which is probably worse than the shark. Then, when things were starting to look bleak, he gets in the cage and is face to face with the shark. Quint makes it clear that he knows what it does but you don't hear him volunteering to get in that cage.
Quint, on the other hand, is an arrogant narcissist who gets himself killed, nearly gets the whole crew killed (and would have if not for Brody), and fails in his only mission, the one he bragged he was the only one that could do. He is, in the end, kinda pathetic. Which, if there is a point about masculinity in this movie, that may be it.

I forgot about that, yeah, Quint really is the ****in' worst. That's the last kinda guy you want along with you on anything. Stupid, self-centered, thoughtless, and impulsive, just generally a danger to himself and everyone around him. Society is probably better with him in Bruce's belly.
And again, that may actually be the point of that whole "three guys in a boat" part of the movie.
The other two survive in spite of Quint, obviously, through the heroism of Brody.

I think there is a lot to be said about holding Quint up to some idealization of masulinity. What is clearly being observed here is that because he appears to be the most masculine (he's gruff natured and acts irresponsibily) he is by default the most heroic. It's almost like completely superficial readings of masculinity and heroism are what are at play here. Not any actual analysis of the character and what he actually does over the course of the movie.


Similarly, Brody is some kind of wet blanket of a man, even though he is actually the one who saves the day. It's almost like his character traits of being a family man and showing his vulnerabilities negates the fact that he's obviously the ****ing hero here.

Jaws is just the best damn film there is. If it's too slow for you (or anyone else) that's OK. But it isn't too slow for the film. The pacing is perfect.

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5-time MoFo Award winner.

Jezus, Jaws is just a good movie. It doesn't need to be dissected, analyzed or philosophized. Besides we all know that the shark was the real victim in the movie...It did nothing wrong but feed itself and yet was victimized by self righteous humans

The ending in the book is a bit different. Quint and Hooper both die, and Brody only survives because the shark dies from the various wounds it received during the fishing trip. Spielberg didn't want such a gloomy ending, so he changed it up.
I think to really understand Jaws, we need to understand Moby Dick, and for that, we need to know what inspired Melville to write it. Like Quint's ordeal with the Indianapolis (a true story everybody should learn about!), a similar incident happened to a whaling ship out of Nantucket called the Essex. However, instead of Japanese torpedoes, the Essex was sunk by a whale. The Essex was captained by captain Pollard, who became Ahab, who then became Quint. What happened is that Pollard was out on longboats hunting whales when a sperm whale basically sunk his ship by ramming it twice, leaving Pollard and his crew stranded on the longboats in the middle of nowhere.

So what did Melville think of Pollard? Melville said "To the islanders he was a nobody—to me, the most impressive man, tho’ wholly unassuming, even humble—that I ever encountered.”

Hardly the basis for a narcissistic lunatic.
I know it's easy to think of Brody as the hero, but I think he is simply Benchley's version of Ishmael. The real story is what happens to a man after living through hell, and Ishmael/Brody are there to tell the story. This is why both characters are fairly bland with no knowledge of whaling/sharking prior to the fishing trip. This is to allow the reader to understand how men like Ahab/Quint/Pollard can be affected by life changing events that most men will never have to endure. We will never understand what happened to them, but we can observe their subsequent behavior.

I'm pretty sure that you thought that taking an ax to the radio so Brody couldn't call for help was the action of a madman, I see it as trying to tie up the loose end of being able to call for help, which is not what Pollard was able to do. The Indianapolis was in much the same situation, which Quint explains in his drunken monologue. They couldn't call for help because they had been on a secret mission to deliver the atomic bombs that were later dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Was Quint an arrogant narcissist? No, I don't think so. He was forged by a terrible incident into a man with a singular purpose in life. His death was necessary to the character in order to show how far he would go towards that purpose.

I agree with you that the film is not "too slow". It took its time solidly building the scenario, ever increasing the suspense and tension. It took the country by storm in the summer of 1975, and it was practically the only film anyone was talking about.

The picture knocked me out when I saw it. The only problem is that ever since 1975 I've not been able to swim out into the ocean anymore. And I live on the Gulf Coast. Wading or swimming in water deeper than my waist or chest gives me visions of my legs dangling in the water, and some shark attacking me. It's silly, but I can't shake it. It's like people who get scared in the shower ever since they saw Psycho.

Perhaps some folks feel that Jaws is slow because of its contrast to some of the modern horror movies, which seemingly jump right into fright and gore right from the git-go. Not sure about that. I don't watch horror movies.

IMO Jaws was not only a landmark film and an enormous blockbuster, but it was a great film as well.

Benchley's Jaws is notoriously a POS pulp tome and the film has long been considered one of the rare feats of making a classic from crappy source material and no one in the world thinks the book is better than the film except someone who may or may not be responsible for educating your child.

Also, Ishmael had lots of knowledge of whaling, the Pequod wasn't his first venture, but since we're just riffing, I guess who has time to read these days?

So a man who comes out of a traumatic experience and is willing to endanger the lives of two other men (and by extension cost at least one family their provider and protector) is "manly" why?

If you want to see Quint as the most compelling figure in the film, that's fine.

But nothing you are talking about is particularly masculine, is it?

Assuming you alone can handle an overwhelming problem and endangering the lives of others just to serve your own personal purposes is literally the definition of being an arrogant (overestimating one's own abilities) narcissist (self-centered).

And if the purpose of the radio-smashing was the script wanting to recreate the Indianapolis, then why not have the radio get damaged in any other way? Given that Quint himself is the one that smashes the radio, isn't the much more obvious conclusion that Quint is recreating what happened on the Indianapolis, recreating the conditions in which he was formerly powerless so that he can this time be powerful and triumphant?

Also: if you need to understand the history of the real man who inspired Moby Dick who inspired the author of Jaws which was adapted into the film . . . in order to understand the film, I think you're doing too much heavy lifting.