| Jaws 2 | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Jeannot Szwarc |
| Produced by | David Brown Richard D. Zanuck |
| Screenplay by | Carl Gottlieb Howard Sackler |
| Based on | Characters: Peter Benchley |
| Starring | Roy Scheider Lorraine Gary Murray Hamilton Joseph Mascolo Jeffrey Kramer |
| Music by | John Williams |
| Cinematography | Michael Butler |
| Editing by | Neil Travis Arthur Schmidt Steve Potter |
| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
| Release date(s) | June 16, 1978 |
| Running time | 116 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Budget | $30 million |
| Box office | $208,900,376 |
Jaws 2 is a 1978 thriller film and the first sequel to Steven Spielberg's Jaws (1975), which is based on Peter Benchley's novel of the same name. Directed by Jeannot Szwarc, it stars Roy Scheider as Police Chief Martin Brody, who must deal with another great white shark terrorizing the waters of Amity Island, a fictional seaside resort.
Like the first film, the production of Jaws 2 was troubled. The original director, John D. Hancock, proved to be unsuitable for an action film and was replaced by Szwarc.[1] Scheider, who only reprised his role to end a contractual issue with Universal, was also unhappy during production and had several heated exchanges with Szwarc.[2]
Jaws 2 remained on Variety's list of top ten box office hits of all time until the mid-1990s, and was the highest-grossing sequel in history until 1980. 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 movie history and has been parodied and homaged several times.[3] It is widely regarded as the best Jaws sequel.[4]
Contents |
Two divers are photographing the wreck of the Orca, Quint's boat from the first film. They are suddenly attacked and killed by a large great white shark, but not before one of the divers' camera gets a photo of the shark's profile. The shark later prowls the coastal waters of Amity Island, killing a female water skier. The female driver of the speedboat tries to defend herself by first throwing a gasoline tank at the shark (accidentally spilling some on herself) and then igniting the fuel with a flare gun. The fire ignites the gas tank and the speedboat explodes, killing the driver and leaving the shark heavily scarred on the right side of his head.
In addition to these incidents, a dead killer whale is beached at a nearby lighthouse with large wounds all over its body, which Police Chief Martin Brody (Roy Scheider) suggests were caused by a great white shark. Once again, Mayor Vaughn (Murray Hamilton) doesn't share Brody's belief that the town has another shark problem and warns him not to do something hasty. Later, Brody spots a section of a ruined speedboat bobbing in the surf just off the beach. When he goes to retrieve it, he encounters the burnt remains of the female speedboat driver.
Brody angrily grounds his son Mike (Mark Gruner) because of his reluctance to find a summer job, preferring to go sailing every day, and gives him a job at the beach. The following day, while Brody is in an observation tower, he sees a large shadow produced by a school of bluefish, which he mistakes for a shark. In his haste, Brody orders everyone out of the water and fires his gun, causing a panic. Later that evening, he receives the photo of the shark's eye, taken by one of the attacked divers. Brody shows it to Vaughn and his townsmen, but they refuse to accept the evidence put in front of them. Len Peterson (Joseph Mascolo) (who has built a new resort in Amity to attract people) and the town council fire Brody for the beach incident, with Mayor Vaughn being the only one to vote against dismissal, and promote Deputy Hendricks (Jeffrey Kramer) to Brody's position.
The next morning, Mike sneaks out and goes sailing with his friends, but has to take his young brother Sean (Mark Gilpin) along to stop him telling his parents about Mike's trip. Later, they go past a group of divers led by Tom Andrews (Barry Coe). Tom encounters the shark minutes after entering the water to catch lobsters and escapes, but suffers an embolism due to rushing to the surface too fast. Tina (Ann Dusenberry) and Eddie (Gary Dubin) later encounter the shark when he smashes into their sailboat, devouring Eddie and leaving Tina terrified and alone.
Brody and his wife Ellen (Lorraine Gary) find the panicked diver being put into an ambulance, and Brody suspects that something must have scared him to make him come up so fast. Hendricks informs Brody that Mike has gone out sailing to the lighthouse with his friends, so Brody insists on taking the police launch to rescue them, with Ellen and Hendricks both joining him. They find Tina's boat, with Tina hiding in the hull, who confirms Brody's suspicions about the shark in the area. Hendricks and Ellen take Tina ashore in a passing boat, while Brody continues to search for the teenagers using the police launch.
All seems well with the other teenagers, until the shark appears, smashing into one of their sail boats, causing panic and their boats to collide with each other. Mike is knocked unconscious and is pulled out of the water just as the shark appears; two friends take him back to the shore for help. The rest of the teens remain floating on the wreckage of tangled boats, drifting out toward the open sea. A Harbor Patrol marine helicopter arrives and a line is rigged to tow the boats to shore, but before the pilot can tow them, the shark attacks the chopper causing it to crash into the water. Sean also falls into the water, but is quickly saved by Marge (Martha Swatek). As Marge tries to get back into the boat, her hands slip on the wet hull, and she falls back into the water. The shark approaches and devours Marge. Back at mainland, Tina is sent to the hospital, and Ellen berates Peterson for getting Brody fired and denying the shark's presence.
Brody encounters Mike, who informs his father about the situation. Sean and his friends are drifting on the wreckage toward Cable Junction, a small rocky island housing an electrical relay station (with the open sea beyond it). Brody quickly finds the teenagers, but the shark attacks again, which causes Brody to run his boat aground on the rocks. Brody tries to tie a rope line, but snags an underwater power cable instead. Most of the teenagers are tossed into the water during the shark's next attack, and they swim to safety on Cable Junction, but the shark injures Lucy. Using an inflatable raft, Brody gets the shark's attention by pounding the power line with an oar, and gets the shark to bite the power cable. The plan succeeds, the shark gets electrocuted and sinks to the bottom of the sea, dead. Brody collects Sean and Jackie and paddles over to Cable Junction, to await rescue with the other teenagers.
The studio ordered a sequel early into the success of Jaws.[1] The success of The Godfather Part II and other sequels meant that the producers were under pressure to deliver a bigger and better shark. They realized that someone else would produce the film if they didn't, and they preferred to be in charge of the project themselves.[5]
In October 1975, Steven Spielberg told the San Francisco Film Festival that "making a sequel to anything is just a cheap carny trick" and that he did not even respond to the producers when they asked him to direct Jaws 2. He told the audience that the planned plot was to involve the sons of Quint and Brody hunting a new shark.[6] Brown said that Spielberg did not want to direct the sequel because he felt that he had done the "definitive shark movie".[1][7] The director later added that his decision was influenced by the problems the Jaws production faced - "I would have done the sequel if I hadn’t had such a horrible time at sea on the first film."[8]
Despite Spielberg's rejection the studio went ahead with plans to make the sequel leading to an arduous 18 month pre-production process. 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, the story relayed by Quint in the first film. Although Universal Studios President Sid Sheinberg thought Sackler's treatment for the film was intriguing, the executive rejected the idea.[9] On Sackler's recommendation, theatre and film director John D. Hancock was chosen to helm the picture.[10] Sackler later felt betrayed when Dorothy Tristan, Hancock's wife, was invited to rewrite his script.
The film, under Hancock's direction and Tristan's writing, had originally a different tone and premise than what would eventually be seen in the final film. The two had envisioned Amity as a sort of ghost-town when the film opened with several businesses shuttered and the overall economy of the island in ruins due to the events portrayed in the original film. The new resort and condos built on the island by developer Len Peterson were to help celebrate its rebirth giving the island's economy a much needed boost. Tristan had borrowed a subplot from the original Jaws novel and from a discarded early draft of the original film, in which Amity officials were in debt to the mafia. Both Mayor Vaughn and Len Peterson were anxious for the new island resort to be a success not only to revive Amity but to pay back loans from the mob that helped build it, thus leading to Vaughn's and Peterson's ignoring of Brody's warning. Tristan and Hancock felt this treatment would lead to more character development that would make the overall story that much more believable.
Hancock began filming the movie in June 1977. However, after nearly a month of filming Universal and MCA executives disliked the dark subtle tone that the film was taking and wanted a more lighthearted and action oriented story. Additionally Hancock ran into trouble with MCA executive Sid Sheinberg. Sheinberg suggested to Hancock and Tristan that his wife Lorraine Gary "should go out on a boat and help to rescue the kids." When told of the idea, Richard D. Zanuck replied, "Over my dead body." The next draft of the Jaws 2 screenplay was turned in with Gary not going out to sea. Hancock says that this, and his later firing of another actress who turned out to be the girlfriend of a Universal executive, contributed to his own dismissal from the film.[11]
Hancock began to feel the pressure of directing his first epic adventure film "with only three film credits, and all small-scale dramas".[12] 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 left for Rome and production was shut down for a few weeks. The couple had been involved in the film for eighteen months.[13] Hancock blamed his departure on the mechanical shark, telling a newspaper that it still couldn't swim or bite after a year and a half; "You get a couple of shots and [the shark] breaks."[14] 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 Gottlieb to do the rewrite than it would have if they had hired him in the first place.[15]
At this point, Spielberg considered returning to direct the sequel. Over the Bicentennial weekend Spielberg hammered out a screenplay based on Quint's Indianapolis 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.[16] 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-direct it.[1][17] The request was declined by the Directors Guild of America,[18] partly because they would not allow a DGA member to be replaced by someone who was not 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 movie Bug and Night Gallery and whom Alves knew from the Night Gallery days.[19] Szwarc recommenced production by filming the complicated waterskier scene, giving Gottlieb some time to write.[1] He reinstated the character of Deputy Hendricks, played by Jeffrey Kramer, who had been missing from the original script.[1] Many of the teenagers were sacked, with the remaining roles developed.[20]
Three sharks were built for the film. The first was the "platform shark", also referred to as the "luxurious shark". Special mechanical effects supervisor Bob Mattey and Roy Arbogast used the same body mold used for the shark in the original film.[1] The original "Bruce" sharks rotted behind sheds on the lower lot of Universal Studios, the only pieces that were salvageable were the chromoly tube frames. Mattey's design was much more complicated and ambitious than the original film. The same (male) "Bruce" body was used; even though JAWS 2's shark is described as female. A brand new head was also sculpted by sculptor Chris Mueller which made use of an all new mouth mechanism, one which incorporated jowls to disguise the pinching of the cheeks that had proven to be a problem with the original "Bruce" shark. The sharks were known as Bruce Two (after the original sharks), but on set they were referred to as "Fidel" and "Harold", after David Brown's Beverly Hills lawyer.[21] The other 'sharks' were a fin and a full shark, both of which could be pulled by boats. "Cable Junction", the island shown in the climax of the movie, was a floating barge. This was created in order to have the effects platform positioned as close to the island as possible. Like the first film, footage of real sharks filmed by Australian divers Ron & Valerie Taylor were used for movement shots that could not be convincingly achieved using the mechanical sharks.[1]
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. 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. The filmmakers gave the new shark a more menacing look by scarring it in the early boat explosion.[1]
Like the first film, shooting on water proved challenging. Scheider said that they were "always contending with tides, surf and winds [...] jellyfish, sharks, waterspouts and hurricane warnings."[21] After spending hours anchoring the sailboats, the wind would change as they were ready to shoot, blowing the sails in the wrong direction. The corrosive effect of the saltwater damaged some equipment, including the metal parts in the sharks.[21]
Susan Ford, daughter of US president Gerald Ford, was hired to shoot publicity photographs.[22] Many of these appeared in Ray Loynd's Jaws 2 Log, a book documenting the production the film in the same way as Carl Gottlieb had for the first film.
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.[23] 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.[24]
Many residents enjoyed being cast as extras. Some people, however, were less pleased by the presence of the film crew and refused to cooperate. 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.[25]
The majority of filming was at Navarre Beach in Florida, because of the warm weather and the water's depth being appropriate for the shark platform. The company was at this location from August 1 until December 22, 1977.[1] The production "was a boost to the local economy because local boaters, extras and stand-ins or doubles were hired. Universal brought in actors, directors, producers and their wives, camera and crew people who needed housing, food and clothing for the movie. Services were needed for laundry, dry-cleaning and recreation." Navarre's Holiday Inn "Holidome" was used as the film's headquarters, with the ground floor converted into production offices, and some of the Gulf-front suites remodelled for David Brown and Roy Scheider. Universal rented 100 of the hotel's 200 rooms, spending $1 million.[26] Boats and parts for their maintenance were purchased from local businesses. One proprietor said that he sold "Universal approximately $400,000 worth of boats and equipment".[27]
Cable Junction Island was built on a barge so that the huge mechanism of the platform shark could go 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.[1] Real hammerhead sharks circled the teen actors during the filming of one shot. Because the characters they were playing were meant to be in distress, the crew (filming from a distance) did not realize that the actors were genuinely calling for help.[28]
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 later relocated to Destin, Florida as its original building was susceptible to hurricane damage.[26] 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.
Principal photography ended three days before Christmas 1977, on the Choctawhatchee Bay, near Destin, Florida.[14] The actors had to put ice cubes in their mouths to prevent their breath showing on camera. The final sequence to be filmed was the shark being electrocuted on the cable.[1] In mid-January the crew reconverged in Hollywood with some of the teenage actors for five weeks of post-production photography.[14]
Jaws 2 cost $30 million to produce, over three times more than the original. David Brown says that they did not budget the film "because Universal would never have given a green light to a $30 million budget in those days."[7] The Marine Division Head for Universal on location, Philip Kingry, says that "It cost approximately $80,000 per day to make that movie." When Kingry asked Brown what his budget was, the producer responded, "We're not wasteful, but we're spending the profit from Jaws, and it will take what it takes."[27]
Roy Scheider reluctantly returned to reprise his role as Martin Brody. He had quit the role of Steven Pushkov in The Deer Hunter two weeks before the start of filming because of "creative differences".[29] Universal used Scheider's failure to fulfill this contractual obligation to force him to appear in Jaws 2. The actor heavily resisted the film, claiming that there was nothing new to create and that people would be watching the film to see the shark, not him.[29] According to his biographer, Scheider was so desperate to be relieved from the role that he "pleaded insanity and went crazy in The Beverly Hills Hotel".[29] He made Marathon Man and Sorcerer to put as much time as he could between the two Jaws films.[5] However, he was given an attractive financial package for appearing in Jaws 2; he quadrupled his base salary from the first film, and negotiated points (a percentage of the film's net profits).[5] The Star newspaper reported that Scheider received $500,000 for 12 weeks work, plus $35,000 for each additional week that the schedule ran over.[5]
Despite his reluctance, Scheider pledged to do the best job that he could, wanting to make Brody believable.[30] However, the atmosphere was tense on the set, and he often argued with director Szwarc. On one occasion, Scheider complained (in front of extras) that Szwarc was wasting time with technical issues and the extras whilst ignoring the principal actors. A meeting was called with the two, David Brown and Verna Fields, in which Scheider and Szwarc were encouraged to settle their differences. The discussion became heated and a physical fight broke out, which Brown and Fields broke up.[22] The rift was also 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.[2] Szwarc's reply focused 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[31]
Many extras were recruited from Gulf Breeze High School. The students were paid $3 per hour, well above the minimum wage at the time, and revelled in being able to miss classes. Casting director Shari Rhodes, requested members of the Gulf Breeze band performed as the Amity High Band, seen in an early scene in the film showing the opening of the Holiday Inn Amity Shores "Amity Scholarship Fund Benefit". "The GBHS band consisted of approximately 100 members, and band director John Henley chose 28 student musicians, including the section of the band known as Henley's Honkers." Universal scheduled their involvement for mid-afternoons to prevent them missing too much time in school. Universal made a contribution of $3,500 to the school and the band for their part in the film.[32] Several other GBHS students were hired as stand-ins or doubles for the teenage actors to appear in the water scenes and to maintain and sail the boats.[33]
| Jaws 2 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Soundtrack album by John Williams | |||
| Released | 1978 | ||
| Recorded | 20th Century Fox Studios, Stage One | ||
| Genre | Film score | ||
| Length | 41:19 | ||
| Label | MCA Records | ||
| Producer | John Williams | ||
| Professional reviews | |||
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John Williams returned to score Jaws 2 after winning an Academy Award for Original Music Score for his work on the first film. Williams says that it was assumed by everyone that "the music would come back also and be part of the cast ... it would require new music, certainly, but the signature music of Jaws should be used as well". He compares this to "the great tradition" for repeating musical themes in Hollywood serials such as Roy Rogers and The Lone Ranger. In addition to the familiar themes, director Szwarc says Williams also composed a "youthful counterpoint to the shark that is always around when the kids are sailing or going out to sea. It was very inventive".[34]
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. Williams used a larger ensemble than for the first film, and "the orchestral palette may have been broader or had longer notes". Delays in shooting meant that Williams was forced to start working on the score before the film was completed. Szwarc discussed the film with the composer, showing him edited sequences and storyboards. The director praises Williams in being able to work under such difficult conditions.[34] Critic Mike Beek suggests these time constraints enabled Williams "to create themes based on ideas and suggestions, rather than a locked down print."[4]
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" than 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."[35]
According to the liner notes on the soundtrack album, 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."[36] Mike Beek makes positive comments about the film, saying that "the music certainly elevates it to a level it would otherwise never have achieved."[4] The cover of the album features a different image than the main theatrical poster; instead of the water skier sequence, the album depicts the scene with Eddie and Tina.
| Side one | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Title | Length | |||||||
| 1. | "Finding the 'Orca' (Main Title)" | 3:15 | |||||||
| 2. | "The Menu" | 1:49 | |||||||
| 3. | "Ballet for Divers" | 2:56 | |||||||
| 4. | "The Water Kite Sequence" | 2:52 | |||||||
| 5. | "Brody Misunderstood" | 2:49 | |||||||
| 6. | "The Catamaran Race" | 2:08 | |||||||
| 7. | "Toward Cable Junction" | 3:45 | |||||||
| 8. | "Attack on the Helicopter" | 1:58 | |||||||
| Side two | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Title | Length | |||||||
| 1. | "The Open Sea" | 2:03 | |||||||
| 2. | "Fire Aboard and Eddie's Death" | 3:25 | |||||||
| 3. | "Sean's Rescue" | 2:55 | |||||||
| 4. | "Attack on the Water Skier" | 2:40 | |||||||
| 5. | "The Big Jolt!" | 4:39 | |||||||
| 6. | "End Title, End Cast" | 3:21 | |||||||
Jaws 2 was the most expensive film that Universal had produced up until that point, costing the studio almost $30 million.[5] The film grossed 45% of the original, not adjusting for inflation.[37] Despite this, the film became the highest-grossing sequel in history at that point, succeeded by the release of Rocky II in 1979. It opened in 640 theaters to a $9,866,023 gross, ranking first.[38] The domestic gross for its first release was $81,766,007, making it the sixth highest domestic grossing film of 1978. It eventually surpassed the $100 million mark with further reissues, with a final gross of $102,922,376.[39][40] It was also the third highest grossing movie worldwide in 1978 with $187,884,007. Its current worldwide gross stands at $208,900,376, so that it stayed on Variety's list of top ten box office hits of all time until the mid-nineties.[41]
Jaws 2 inspired much more merchandising and sponsors than the first film. Products included sets of trading cards from Topps and Baker's bread, paper cups from Coca-Cola, beach towels, a souvenir program, shark tooth necklaces, coloring and activity books, and a model kit of Brody's truck.[42] A novelization by Hank Searls, based on an earlier draft of the screenplay by Sackler and Tristan, was released, as well as Ray Loynd's The Jaws 2 Log, an account of the film's production.[42]
The film has met with mixed reviews, though it is widely regarded as the best of the Jaws sequels. On the film's Rotten Tomatoes listing, 56% of critics gave the film positive reviews.[43] DVD Authority says "After this one, the other Jaws movies seemed to just not be as good.[44] 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."[35] The performances of Scheider, Gary and Hamilton are particularly praised.[4][42][45] George Morris for the Texas Monthly preferred Jaws 2 over the original because it is "less insidious in its methods of manipulation" and "because director Jeannot Szwarc streamlines the terror ... By crosscutting among the teenagers, Scheider, and the officials' efforts to rescue them, Szwarc works up enough suspense to keep the adrenaline going."[46] However, Morris' review is not entirely complimentary. He would have preferred the shark to have been seen less, positing "producers and audiences alike seem to have forgotten that the greatest suspense derives from the unseen and the unknown, and that the imagination is capable of conceiving far worse than the materialization of a mere mechanical monster."[46] Similarly, John Simon felt that the "shark's waning is caused by a decline in direction: Jeannot Szwarc has none of Steven Spielberg's manipulative cleverness. For one thing, he allows us close and disarming close-ups of the shark almost immediately..."[45] A reviewer for the BBC complained that the additional screen time awarded to the shark makes it "seems far less terrifying than its almost mystical contemporary".[47] The Radio Times was not pleased with Jaws 2, calling it a "pale imitation of the classic original" and stating that "the suspense comes unglued because the film floats in all-too-familiar waters. You just know how everyone is going to react — from the stars to the director, and even the mechanical shark."[48]
Although many critics identify some flaws, often comparing Szwarc negatively to Spielberg, they say that "this sequel does have some redeeming qualities going for it that make it a good movie in its own right".[49] The presence of Richard Dreyfuss and Robert Shaw are missed, especially since the teenage characters are labeled "largely annoying 'Afterschool Special' archetypes"[50] who are "irritating and incessantly screaming" and "don't make for very sympathetic victims".[47] 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.[51]
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.[26][42] Andrew J. Kuehn, who developed the trailer for the original Jaws, is credited with coining the phrase.[3] It has been parodied in numerous films; most notably the tagline of the 1996 feature film adaptation of the television series, Flipper, "This summer it's finally safe to go back in the water."[52]
In 1980, MCA Home Video (then known as MCA Videocassette Inc.) released Jaws 2 on VHS and Laserdisc, following its 1980 theatrical re-release in theaters. In the 1990s, MCA-Universal Home Video reissued it on both formats. The film received a DVD release on May 22, 2001.[53] Many reviewers praised it for the quantity of special features,[50] with DVD Authority asserting that it had "more than a lot of titles labeled as 'special edition' discs".[44] 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 problem with its original French title, Les Dents de la mer 2, as it sounded like it ended with the expletive merde (mer deux). This was combated by using the suffix Part 2.[54]
The disc also contains a variety of deleted scenes. These scenes show the animosity between Brody and his wife's boss, and the selectmen voting to fire Brody; the Mayor (Murray Hamilton) is the only person to vote to save him. These scenes were cut because they were slowing the pace of the film.[1] Also included is footage of the shark attacking the coast guard pilot underwater after his helicopter had capsized. The scene was cut because of the struggle with the ratings board to acquire a PG certificate.[1]
Although the audio was presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 mono, a reviewer for Film Freak Central comments that "Williams' score often sounds deceptively stereophonic".[50] The BBC, though, suggest that the mix "really demands the added bass that a 5.1 effort could have lent it".[55]
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