No one intends to make a big wretched Hollywood movie (we are not talking about independent studios or miniscule budgets), rather quality talent, professionalism, a decent budget how did this happen, let’s investigate…
There some film franchises that keep staggering, and likely should have ended long ago Amityville and Witchcraft, but no one truly sets out to destroy one completely, that was until this production. It was 5-years after the last outing, but once more it was to involve the Brody family, why no clear reasoning or was there… Sidney Sheinberg was at the time of the release of this film the CEO of MCA, Inc. and Universal a position he held for over 20-years, an incredible feat in such a volatile film industry market, but was accredited in discovering Steven Spielberg, and back the production of Jaws [1975]. Now how does that tie back to this production, well at the time, Lorraine Gary was married to Sidney (a marriage that lasted over 60-years until his death in 2019), she was lured out of retirement to make this film, because the studio sought to reconnect audiences back to its heyday of past glories. A series of major problems existed in the plot, the script the entire storyline simply sucks, the worst chum possible; resulting and agreeable from both the fans of series and critics that it is not just a bad movie, but very incompetent in design and storytelling, so many puzzling decisions. Let’s explore further, who’s responsible for this disastrous occurrence Sidney was aware of the financial troubles at the studio, so he looked back at some Universal’s properties for hope and there was Jaws, he reached out to Sargent, who was primarily a television director, though had feature film experience most notable The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974), also made Nightmares [1983] but more importantly was accustomed to tight and frantic shooting schedules. He sweetens the deal by granting creative freedom, casting liberties and even producer credit, with all that it was a yes, Sargent originally suggested 3D, but the heat of the tropics too greatly affected the camera, so that idea was squashed. The screenplay, first excuse Peter Benchley’s involvement he was only ode credit due to character development, the man at the center of this mess was Michael De Guzman, who only created TV movies and teleplays, no features, and no longer works in the film industry business. These two men had to work quickly, it was late 1986 and the film delivery was summer of 1987; they want Brody back but to his role limited and his exit reminiscent of the shock that Alfred Hitchcock did in the Psycho [1960] famous shower scene. The reasoning the Jaws productions often took lengthy process to ready them for the camera and post-production by the studio wanted it done and packaged for a summer release in 1987, which gave it a scant 9-months; this explains a portion of the film’s pacing as it seems tension was attempted only to squander as if a commercial break was timed to interrupt. Sidney lent the suggestion of a character driven movie rather just another shark movie, and discount parts 2 and 3, which was fine Guzman who never saw them, they took this a new direction from the franchise.
Nowadays, the audiences are familiar with terms reimagine or rebooted, but in 1986/7 that was unheard of just look at Halloween III [1982], the telling of a horrific tale but without Michael Myers the core of fans were upset, it took nearly 30-years for that film to grow a legion of fans. Therefore, this storyline would not have any connection to parts 2 or 3; it would rather be a ‘refresh’; think of the Halloween franchise’s latest trilogy is forever going to know as the Blumhouse Universe. Therefore, the true connection is Ellen Brody, aside from that role the career paths nor the ages would not match for Mike and Sean character roles. The film also held for the longest time a working title of Jaws: The Return and later toyed with Jaws 4 a title then used in Japan. The studio didn’t take its own advice, curious of what I mean, well the title state revenge while the tagline reads “this time its personal” if you recall back to Jaws 2 [1978] the character Dr. Elkins “Sharks don’t take things personally, Mr. Brody,” this a factual statement. After the release of this film, Sargent returned to finish out his career on the small screen, as the film bombed at the domestic box office, earning $20 million, although international returns tallied over $30 million, seeking a very modest profit margin.
Roy Scheider turned down the opportunity to reprise his role, even with the promise of ending his character Martin, and his denial, the simply eliminated him with a heart attack his beloved photo proudly displayed on the wall of the Amity police station.
The storyline would primarily focus on the character of Ellen, a widow and mother of her son, Sean (Mitchell Anderson (Deadly Dreams [1988])) the deputy at the police station where his father worked, and seems to be engaged, thereby trying to put a more emotional step forward. However, as the story works itself out the shark is swimming (sneaking) into the bay, with a plan. Hold on for this, to dislodge a pier piling and somehow get it lodged onto a channel buoy marker to prevent fishermen from being able to return to port, wow that is a complex multiple plans by the shark. Sean heads to it and remove it, while the town’s marching band and choir practice for the Christmas festivities, by the way the shark is lurking and the filming manner is POV of the shark except the manner is wrong, the position of the shark’s line of sight would have the eyes at its dorsal fin. OOPS too high. The kill scene takes far too long, sharks don’t play with a meal, not like an Orca, all the subtle angle and tension that the first had is gone, the concept of Sean standing to left of screen and wait for something to fill-in the void to right; we know the shark is in the water hence no water angle needed.
Blood in the Water before biting Sean.
Sean’s screams are drowned by the choir’s loud singers and soon he is submerged beneath the clam sea. Gary does a solid job of convincingly mourning her son, and identifying his remains, soon Michael (Lance Guest (Halloween II [1978]) and his family return to the island for the funeral, with his dumb opening line of dialogue “how is she? (reference her mother)” sheesh she lost her youngest son in brutal manner. A minor note, when Thea (Judith Barsi, more on her later) her remark of Uncle Sean died and when will he return, is both cute and a child unable to understand death, though slightly deeper playing on the original title “The Return.” In addition, a pure trivial note, to comfort Ellen is the returning characters of Mrs. Taft (Fritzi Jane Courtney), who denied the shark’s existence in Part 2, and upset with beach closures in part 1 and joined by Mrs., Kintner (Lee Fierro) I suppose all is forgiven as she blamed her husband for her son dying by shark attack.
After the funeral Mrs. Brody follows her son and his family back to Bahamas but insist he not go back into the water as a marine biologist because the shark is coming for them; en route we meet Hoagie portrayed by the acclaimed actor Michael Caine (The Swarm [1978]). The shark has a personal grudge against the Brody family and the story establishing a psychic bond of Ellen to the beast, and oh my travels beyond any normal conceived manner – the distance between Amity to Bahamas is approximately 1,250 miles, the best a shark likely to do is 50-miles a day. For those unaware Ellen’s trip took 3-days, this shark would have needed nearly 25 days, but who cares. Michael assures his mother that great whites don’t like warm water, a statement, which was believable in 80s, however a ruined theory nowadays thanks in part to increase studies and tracking, sharks can adjust to temperatures 54 to 75 ideally but with good food sources exist off most coastlines. Michael is suspicious of voicing his concerns to his friend and colleague Jake (Mario Van Peebles (Full Eclipse [1993])), was given permission to create his own dialogue. These two begin tracking the shark while balancing time with the study of Conch shells, here we get some elements of foreshadowing namely electrical impulse, heartbeat of shark and the importance of a rope to help secure people. Needless to state this film’s body is the smallest of all Jaws movies, with just two deaths (well sort of), that didn’t satisfy the audience either. I need to mention Carla Brody, Michael’s wife (Karen Young (The Orphan Killer [2011])) given such a minor role and corniest lines, though, Mike states to her at one point “I’ve always wanted to make love to an angry welder. I’ve dreamed of nothing else since I was a small boy.” Seriously WTF!
In that final act, we have a guest appearance of Melvin Van Peebles (The Shining [2007]) as mayor Mr. Witherspoon, while witnessing our second death in the movie; the storyboarding for this complex shot involving multiple seacrafts, children, and one shark was done with finger drawings on the beach. No, seriously that is what the director did, and no one got hurt, amazingly; no one caught the discolor of ‘Bruce” then or in post-production.
Ellen steals Jake’s schooner sailboat Neptune’s Folly: Mike, Jake and Hoagie set out to find her, who uses her ‘psychic power’ to call out to the shark as she believes it wants revenge against her whole family. *shake head in disbelief* After crashing their small plane in the water and the shark swimming towards them, all three miraculously get on the vessel, with Caine’s wet clothes drying quickly (oops, this actually is because they dried between scenes) to battle the shark in the most insane ending possible, well not exactly. You need to understand there are two different endings, and a reason for them, first Jake dies in the original theatrical release and the shark rises out of the water by a lot just as the tip of the bowsprit of the boat pierce through both sides of the shark, will lots spillage of blood sending into the bottom; with Jake dying shortly beforehand. However, the audiences were displeased with this avenue and 8-days later it was replaced with now Jake heavily maimed after falling into the Shark’s mouth, and the crowd got use to big explosions of the shark and hence the preposterous ending, the same stabbing of the shark except now it explodes for no reason, and interlace with images of Martin shooting the oxygen tank in the original Jaws, which Ellen wasn’t there to witness. Oh, one more thing the shark’s roars at the end of the movie; no kidding.
In the early stages of the quicken pre-production mode, with no script complete nor would it be by the cameras rolled, the studio went out to see about Dennis Quaid reprising his role as Michael, which was a no, and then Bess Armstrong rejected the thought too, especially learning her character would be completely changed and with a different leading man therefore a new story was placed at the feet of Guzman. Sargent forgot an important rule of Spielberg, avoid showing the shark, especially if it doesn’t look good, and it didn’t, so ridiculously fake, more malfunctions, and continuity issues plagued the already tight budget. The actors do attempt the best but with such poor dialogue the emotional investment does wane greatly; Mario brought colorful moments with his character, but clearly a professional diver/ marine biologist was on set handling the conch shells and driving the sub device. It’s often how important the sound is on a set, at times the pitch does change, to overcome nature’s influences, while Michael Small, composer, was charged with attempting to improve upon John Williams’ original score, no small feat, he does an adequate job, but the hint of William’s still echoes through nicely. It was reported that none of the members of the sound department would make a sound effect of ‘Bruce’ the shark rear, as they all knew it was impossible as the species doesn’t roar, therefore the final sound from the shark is actually from a Tom and Jerry animated short on network television. Speaking of television there are few different versions in existence, some for the small screen open the movie with a narration, and others will contain Jake dying therefore it’s always a little curious what will be available; this also lead to another issue which after the movie was adjusted into/formatted screen dimensions and would dreadful show a lot of mechanism of how the shark moved; including at time it was clearly in underwater tank at Universal’s studios. The film finished all photography in early May and was given less than 2-months to edit all-post-production work, the hurried pace off-set worried Frank Baur, associate producer and with 55-years of experience at the time of that movie’s release on July 17, 1987. There was a way to have saved this film sinking to the bottom of the ocean, and would have been to use the plot of the tie-in book by Hank Seals, as you read earlier Ellen has established a psychic bond, premonitions (Amy see me) of the shark, connecting to images that she was not there to actually witness and that shark feels compel to obey and inventing elaborate ways to set up kills. The book uses the storyline that a voodoo priest set the killer shark in motion, as the character Michael hints to the subject early in the movie, this is based on an early draft of script which was later edited out, but not told to the author. The book was released 16-days before and the plot points therein didn’t quite match to the movie, which confused even more moviegoers. There’s one good aspect to the film which is the inclusion of the Junkanoo Festival named after the West African John Canoe Festival, which originated in the Bahamas around the 17th century as a masquerade parade.
One needs to take a moment, especially aspiring actors, to discuss the prolific actor on the film Michael Caine, why did he make this movie, he was moving his family back to England, an underestimated cost of a new home, paid $1.5 million for seven days work in the Bahamas a perfect fit. In fact, he was quoted as saying, “Won an Oscar, built a house, and had a great holiday. Not bad for a flop movie.” However, this actually goes deeper, he was happy to star with Lorraine Gary as the ages were similar, and more believable, he shows his professionalism and natural style when delivering dumb lines of dialogue to give the convincing performance and conviction to the scenes. This movie also coined a new term ‘paycheck movie’ not only for himself but other actors then and now that do films for a fee. I debated including this as it doesn’t directly have anything to do with the film, but I decided to do so for 2 reasons one it being the film’s 35th anniversary but more importantly I feel it serves as important warning against physical and mental abuse especially to a child. There was real-life tragedy that did occur after this movie wrapped and it effected the youngest star Judith Barsi (Thea), as it was one her last films. She was murdered at the age of 10 in her bed, along with her mother, in a drunken rage of her abusive father who set fire to their bodies.
The movie never clearly or even indirectly explains the goofiness of the supposed grudge the ‘shark’ holds against the Brody family, it’s actually absurd for me even to type those words; however, what is the revenge, sharks don’t get personal. It’s like the filmmakers overlooked the title of the movie, and shrugged their shoulders stating never mind, well make an emotional dull movie, with the smallest body count possible. That lasts ten minutes of the film are fill lame dialogue, especially between Michael and his mother, namely her she took the boat because there was no other choice, but really there was, this is not a Wild Eye Releasing or The Asylum production the shark won’t chomp you to death your dreams, staying on land saves you. All right a tad too simplistic, but the cockamamie electro-response device would not create the shark’s response with such turmoil to leap out of the water, a slight irritation yes, but nothing that silly. The movie contains a zero rating on Rotten Tomatoes site, just shows how awful the movie actually is, once thy switch to the Bahamas it drags even more, with a bad story lumbering to a stale finish. If ever expects a new Jaws film they likely need to wait to Spielberg’s passing ad they a remake shall be made – however, I think everyone is pleased enough the franchise stays resting on the bottom of the ocean floor.
TAGLINES:
- This time… It’s personal.
- On Friday June 17, man’s deepest fear will rise again.
- Man’s deepest fear has risen again. [from trailer]
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093300/
IMDb Rating: 3.0/10
Baron’s Rating: 3.0/10
Follows
Jaws [1975]
Jaws 2 [1978]
Jaws 3-D [1983]