RottenTomatoes.com
Log In | Register | What is RT?
Found a Bug? Squash It! Report Bugs Here
  • Home
  • Movies
  • DVD
  • Celebrities
  • News
  • Critics
  • Trailers & Pictures
  • CommunityBeta
  • Box Office
  • | Best Of
  • | Certified Fresh
  • | Showtimes
RT Search Powered by Google
help icon Enhanced RT
searches on Google
Click here to turn on enhanced search results from RT on your Google searches.
 
Movies / On DVD / Jaws
Jaws

Rate this Movie Help Icon

  • Write a Review
  • Read Reviews
  • Add to List
  • Buy Poster External Icon
Bookmark and Share

Jaws (1975)

  • T-Meter Critics
  • Top Critics
  • RT Community
  • My Critics
  • My Friends
  • DVD
100 %
Tomatometer
Template ImageTemplate ImageTemplate Image

How does the Tomatometer work Help Icon

Reviews Counted:36

Fresh:36

Rotten:0

Average Rating:8.8/10

Consensus: Jaws remains tense by not showing audiences the shark for the majority of the film, so that when it does, viewers jump out of their seats.

Runtime: 2 hrs 5 mins

Genre: Horror/Suspense

Synopsis: From the best-selling novel by Peter Benchley, Steven Spielberg directed this thrill ride of terror. During the height of beach season, the Massachusetts resort town of Amity Island is terrorized... From the best-selling novel by Peter Benchley, Steven Spielberg directed this thrill ride of terror. During the height of beach season, the Massachusetts resort town of Amity Island is terrorized one summer by surprise attacks from a great white shark. Three unlikely partners team up to hunt down the rogue and destroy it: the new chief of police from New York (Roy Scheider), a young university-educated oceanographer (Richard Dreyfuss), and a crusty old-time fisherman (Robert Shaw). The film shoot was notoriously difficult for the young Spielberg, who had directed only one feature film before JAWS. The mechanical shark seldom operated correctly, and Spielberg was frequently forced to create the idea of terror without actually showing the shark. However, after the film premiered it went on to become the highest-grossing film of all time--surpassing THE GODFATHER and becoming the first film to gross more than a hundred million dollars. Composer John Williams created the score to JAWS, which has since become a well-known theme of impending doom. Ron and Valerie Taylor were responsible for filming live sharks in Australia; their sequences were later mixed with footage of the mechanical shark. [More]

Starring: Roy Scheider, Richard Dreyfuss, Robert Shaw, Lorraine Gary

Starring: Roy Scheider, Richard Dreyfuss, Robert Shaw, Lorraine Gary, Murray Hamilton, Carl Gottlieb, Jay Mello, Lee Fierro, Jeffrey Kramer, Susan Backlinie, Jonathan Filley

Director: Steven Spielberg

Director: Steven Spielberg
Screenwriter: Carl Gottlieb, Peter Benchley, Howard Sackler
Producer: Richard D. Zanuck, David Brown
Composer: John Williams
Studio: Universal Pictures

[See More Credits]

Reviews for Jaws

  • T-Meter Critics
  • Top Critics
  • RT Community
  • My Critics
  • My Friends
  • DVD
 
 
1 - 20 (sorted by critic A-Z; UK critics are listed first)
Text View | 1 2 >> >|
Arrange By:Fresh | Rotten | Comments | Name | Source | Date
 
 

A reminder that, once upon a time, Spielberg used to make films for adults rather than infants and critical regressives.

Full Review Source: Time Out | comment 3 Comments
06/24/06
Geoff Andrew
Geoff Andrew
Time Out
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

A film that sealed Steven Spielberg's talent as a master entertainer.

Full Review Source: BBC | comment Comment
01/01/00
Almar Haflidason
Almar Haflidason
BBC
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

An astonishingly effective thriller built on a very primal level: fear.

Full Review Source: Empire Magazine | comment Comment
01/01/00
Ian Nathan
Ian Nathan
Empire Magazine
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

A classic. Tense, engrossing, scary and, subsequently, endlessly influential.

Full Review Source: Channel 4 Film | comment Comment
09/24/07
Channel 4 Film
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Nowadays, it doesn't really scare me anymore, but I love watching it for the way it moves.

Full Review Source: Combustible Celluloid | comment 2 Comments
06/24/05
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Combustible Celluloid

One of those rare films that really deserved its commercial success and its place among the best films of all times.

Full Review Source: rec.arts.movies.reviews | comment Comment
01/01/00
Dragan Antulov
Dragan Antulov
rec.arts.movies.reviews

When it comes to this kind of thriller, no movie has been able to top Jaws, although many have tried. And, as the years go by, it seems increasingly unlikely that anything will come close.

Full Review Source: ReelViews | comment Comment
12/12/02
James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli
ReelViews

This film is a still a classic 25 years after its release.

Full Review Source: Mike Bracken's Horror Films | comment Comment
02/13/01
Mike Bracken
Mike Bracken
Mike Bracken's Horror Films

The first calculated summertime blockbuster...A whale of big-budget Hollywood entertainment.

Full Review Source: Boulder Weekly | comment Comment
06/17/05
Thomas Delapa
Thomas Delapa
Boulder Weekly

Jaws (1975) is a masterful, visceral and realistic science-fiction suspense/horror-disaster film, tapping into the most primal of human fears

Full Review Source: Tim Dirks' The Greatest Films | comment Comment
01/01/00
Tim Dirks
Tim Dirks
Tim Dirks' The Greatest Films

One of the most effective thrillers ever made.

Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times | comment Comment
01/01/00
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Chicago Sun-Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

A true film of the 70s, all its characters have feet of clay… Yet Jaws boldly puts [them] to a test as dire as any faced by the granite-jawed supermen of earlier decades.

Full Review Source: Decent Films Guide | comment Comment
02/11/06
Steven D. Greydanus
Steven D. Greydanus
Decent Films Guide

Steven Spielberg's mechanical thriller is guaranteed to make you scream on schedule.

Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment Comment
06/27/07
Dave Kehr
Dave Kehr
Chicago Reader

One of the finest primal scare-thrillers ever to come out of Hollywood.

Full Review Source: Q Network Film Desk | comment Comment
02/27/01
James Kendrick
James Kendrick
Q Network Film Desk

Along with being a terrific character-driven (not plot) thriller, Jaws should be viewed against the broader context of 1975 as part of a cycle of paranoia films, reflecting the Vietnam War, Watergate scandal, anti-authoritarianism, and political apathy

Full Review Source: EmanuelLevy.Com | comment Comment
06/26/05
Emanuel Levy
Emanuel Levy
EmanuelLevy.Com

The fast-moving 124-minute film engenders enormous suspense as the shark attacks a succession of people.

Full Review Source: Variety | comment Comment
06/27/07
A.D. Murphy
A.D. Murphy
Variety
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Simply put, Jaws turned the tide of American cinema: irrevocably, and not for the better.

Full Review Source: City Pages, Minneapolis/St. Paul | comment 1 Comment
08/20/09
Rob Nelson
Rob Nelson
City Pages, Minneapolis/St. Paul

Like Hitchcock, nothing is thrown in without serving a purpose.

Full Review Source: Old School Reviews | comment Comment
01/01/00
John A. Nesbit
John A. Nesbit
Old School Reviews

It was the beast that launched a thousand monster movies.

Full Review Source: Filmcritic.com | comment Comment
01/01/00
Christopher Null
Christopher Null
Filmcritic.com

I loved the film more this time than I had the first time I watched it.

Full Review Source: Goatdog's Movies | comment Comment
02/28/02
Michael W. Phillips, Jr.
Michael W. Phillips, Jr.
Goatdog's Movies
 
 
1 - 20 (sorted by critic A-Z; UK critics are listed first)
Text View | 1 2 >> >|
all

Latest News for Jaws

May 16, 2008: Steven Spielberg's Ten Best-Directed Films
RT counts down the ten best-reviewed films directed by Indiana Jones helmer and modern moviemaking legend, Steven Spielberg. More...

February 13, 2008: Roy Scheider: 1932-2008
Actor Roy Scheider, who earned Oscar nominations for his work in The French Connection and All That Jazz, passed away of undisclosed causes over the weekend. He was 75 years old. More...

January 03, 2008: New Indy 4 Interviews, Pictures Online!
May 22 still feels awfully far away, but if the nearly six-month gap between your eyeballs and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull has you feeling forlorn, fear... More...

December 12, 2007: Walter Murch on Youth Without Youth: The RT Interview (With Exclusive Photos and Clips!)
This week, Francis Ford Coppola's Youth Without Youth hits theaters in limited release. The tale of a writer who becomes young again after being struck by lightning is a... More...

See All

More DVDs

Top Rentals
Tomatometer Percentage Movie
36% 36% Angels & Demons
25% 25% Four Christmases
68% 68% Funny People
95% 95% Star Trek
14% 14% The Ugly Truth

More Rentals…

New On DVD This Week
Tomatometer Percentage Movie
32% 32% Terminator Salvation
44% 44% Night at the Museum: B…
86% 86% A Christmas Tale
60% 60% Paper Heart

More New Releases…

What’s Hot On RT

Twilight Saga: Eclipse

Twilight Saga: Eclipse

5 facts straight from the cast.

Disney Animation

Disney Animation

We chart the studio's classics.

Avatar

Avatar

An exclusive look at the human hardware.

Eric Bana

Eric Bana

The Star Trek star talks cars with RT.

Other News

  • Top Stories
  • Popular
  • Interviews
 
 

Comments

 
 
Top Stories
Headlines Comments
  
  • Spielberg Hops Away from Harvey Source: Variety
21
  • Tarantino Could Have Directed Green Lantern Source: MTV
24
  • Will Duvall be Gilliam's Don Quixote? Source: Collider.com
26
  • No Hobbit Until 2012? Source: The Wrap
22
  • Don't Hold Your Breath for Hancock 2 Source: HitFix
42
  • Peter Berg Talks Battleship Source: CHUD
2
  • Summit Ponders Twilight Finale Source: Variety
159
  • First Look at Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Source: USA Today
56
  • Jeremy Renner Talks Hawkeye Possibilities Source: Superhero Hype
14
  • Todd Phillips Talks The Hangover 2 Source: Entertainment Weekly
18
Popular
Headlines Comments
  
  • Total Recall: Natalie Portman's Best Movies
69
  • Five Favorite Films with Jason Reitman
49
  • Critics Consensus: Everybody's Fine Is Just OK
49
  • 10 Horrifically Profitable Films
45
  • Box Office Guru Wrapup: Vampires and Football Break Thanksgiving Records
42
  • Five Favorite Films with Jesse Ventura
40
  • Sundance 2010: RT's 10 Most Anticipated Movies
38
  • Weekly Ketchup: Tron Team to Remake The Black Hole
30
  • Awards Tour: National Board of Review Winners List!
26
  • RT on DVD & Blu-Ray: Terminator Salvation and a Smithsonian Battle
22
Interviews
Headlines Comments
  
  • Director Ruben Fleischer Talks Zombieland
2
  • "I Don't Hate Women": Lars von Trier on Antichrist
17
  • Eric Bana talks Love the Beast - RT Interview
12
  • Fight Club Sound Designer Reflects on Film's 10th Anniversary
22
  • James Schamus talks Taking Woodstock - RT Interview
8
  • John Hurt Talks Harry Potter, Quentin Crisp and Alien - The RT Interview
15
  • Terry Gilliam Talks Doctor Parnassus
22
  • Wes Anderson Talks Fantastic Mr. Fox - RT Interview
9
  • Wolverine Creator Len Wein Talks About the Film
28
  • Gavin Hood Talks Wolverine; Possible Sequel
28
 
 

Sponsored Links

Around The Network

  • Jaws at Rotten Tomatoes
  • Jaws at IGN

Fresh Links

Featured
RT on YouTube
RT on YouTube External Link

Subscribe to RT's YouTube channel and don't miss a second of our cracking video content.

RT on Twitter
RT on Twitter External Link

Follow Rotten Tomatoes and join us as we tweet about the week's releases.

 
 
About| Site Map| Help| RT To Go| Contact Us| Critics Submission| Linking to RT| Licensing| Movie List| Celebs List| Newsletter
IGN Logo

IGN.com | GameSpy | Comrade | Arena | FilePlanet | GameSpy Technology
TeamXbox | Planets | Vaults | VE3D | CheatsCodesGuides | GameStats | GamerMetrics
AskMen.com | Rotten Tomatoes | Direct2Drive | Green Pixels


By continuing past this page, and by the continued use of this site, you agree to be bound by and abide by the User Agreement.
Copyright 1998-2009, IGN Entertainment, Inc. About IGN | Support | Advertise | Privacy Policy | User Agreement | Subscribe to RT's XML feed! IGN RSS Feeds
IGN's enterprise databases running Oracle, SQL and MySQL are professionally monitored and managed by Pythian Remote DBA
Certain product data ©1995-present Muze, Inc. For personal use only. All rights reserved.