Jaws

 

  Overall, I felt that I did enjoy the film Jaws (1975) by Steven Spielberg. I really liked the director's choices, camera angles, symbolism of the colors and overall suspenseful feeling the movie gave. My favorite scene from the film was the very first scene. This scene begins showing many teenagers and young adults having fun at a party on the beach. Then it cuts to a drunk man and woman sneaking away from the party to go skinny dipping in the water. While the man is too drunk to walk into the water and even know what is going on, the woman immediately goes into the water and takes off her clothes. The audience begins to hear the music gradually get louder and the camera starts shooting from underneath the girl which slowly gets closer to her. Then, we see the woman suddenly get violently thrown around in the water and then vanish from the surface. Even though we never see the shark until later in the film, we still use our imagination and critical thinking to believe that a shark did attack the girl and is lurking in the local waters. I really liked that Spielberg chose to not show the shark right away because it makes the audience feel more suspense. The audience still knows that there is something dangerous in the water, but they don't know exactly what it is, what it looks like, and when it will show up again for its next attack. It also helps the audience use their imagination to think if it is actually a shark and how big it is. 

    I also liked how Spielberg chose to use the color yellow to signal for danger instead of the common color, red. Spielberg chose to use a different color instead of red because he didn't want red to take up the whole movie. He just wanted red to signify for blood. I liked that he chose a different color because I do agree that sticking with red would've have made the film "too red" and the yellow also helps us recognize that danger is coming easier. I believe that this allowed for more suspense because the audience knows that something bad is going to happen, but they don't know what and they don't know how soon. However, I do think that it is interesting that he chose to use yellow as a signal for danger when usually yellow is a common color for joy or happiness. I do believe that yellow was a good color to use because it helped the audience see the danger signals easier because it didn't blend in with the water, but I am curious as to why he didn't use a different color than yellow. Why did he choose to use yellow and not orange, green, white, etc.