Shark bites swimmer, shark bites another swimmer, shark almost bites a third swimmer, shark tries to bite swimmer again. Shark is harpooned in bloody explosion in the sea... Shark limps on to Jaws 2...

"I never found the shark in this movie to be that scary. It was the orchestra that gave me the willies."

"I laugh in the face of the shark in this movie: For me it was the sound of that fisherman's nails scratching the blackboard that gave me nightmares. That and the mystery of the cracker he is eating: there's no box of crackers in sight! Surely he didn't just take one cracker to a meeting like that? This is why Speilberg is not my favorite director: he leaves little details like that just hanging in the air."

"My favorite moment in this movie is the bit when the two guys go fishing for the shark on what looks like a mini pier made out of cardboard. Inevitably, one of the guys gets pulled into the water by the shark. He manages to swim back and is helped back onto what remains of the pier by one of the most limp-wristed attempts to help pull a man out of the water in motion movie history."

"My favorite bit is when Richard Dreyfus does a messy opening-the-full-stomach-of-a shark autopsy in a denim shirt and tie, and nifty brown loafers. Now I have seen everything, apart from a man eating his own head off."

"Is it true that some cinemas had to have oxygen on hand to help people who couldn't help hyperventilating at this movie? It's amazing we managed to get to the 1980's wasn't it?"

"Jaws is for wimps. Nightmare on Elm Street is 10 times scarier. If Freddie Krugger could only ever attack you if you are in the ocean then what's so scary about that? Don't go into the ocean, like, duh!"

"Thank goodness this movie was only filmed in mono, had it been in stereo I just couldn't have stood it!"

"Some people say the shark looks animatronic. Certainly, the one that almost killed me at Disneyworld did, but in all honesty the shark looks quite good in this movie. And at least it wasn't wearing jam jar sized eye glasses."

"Wasn't that fisherman the bad guy off Scooby Doo?"

Our three heroes Police Chief Martin Brody (Roy Scheider), Quint (Robert Shaw) and Matt Hooper (Richard Dreyfuss) go out on the smallest sea fishing boat they can find..

They manage to harpoon the shark and we see a big spurt of blood and giblets coming out of the water so assume they got it.

But unfortunately the boat is sunk and Quint disappears, the two others are left to cling onto a sort of raft, kicking their way to shore.

"You'll need a bigger boat."

"Maybe I should go alone."

"Are you going to close the beaches?"

Part of Quint's speech: "You all know me. You know how I earn a living. I'll catch this bird for ya but it ain't gonna be easy; bad fish. Unlike going down the pond chasing Blue Gills (?) and Tommy Cats (?). This shark will swallow you whole; a bit of shaking, tenderizing and down you go. Gotta do it quick. That'll bring back the tourists, put all your businesses on a paying basis. But it's not going to be pleasant. I value my neck more than 3000 bucks chief. I'll find him for three but I'll catch him and kill him for ten..."

1975 wouldn't have been 1975 without this movie. It was one of those event movies that made the news, everyone was talking about it.

Newspapers were filled with stories of how people had to receive medical attention for hyperventilation and panic attacks in cinemas. People ran out of the cinema shielding their eyes (and presumably fell over things as they weren't look properly).

Jaws would be nothing without the orchestra which is really the main menace. I suppose they brought out a movie soundtrack disk for this movie, it's a good one to play when you are driving, I mean who could possibly fall to sleep at the wheel when that "dum dah" music is playing?

Some poor dialogue, some overlong character speeches but the scary bits still do the business, thanks probably to the utterly superbly unforgettable 'dum dar', music which won an academy award.

This movie is better than all of the sequels put together (written in 2005, the 30 year anniversary of this release).

In many top fifty best/most popular movies of all time in 2005.