The Making of 'Jaws 2'

The Making of Jaws 2 (2001)

*** (out of 4)

Pretty good making of featurette taking a look at the production of JAWS 2, the sequel to one of the most popular films ever made. Producers David Brown and Richard Zanuck start off talking about Steven Spielberg refusing to have anything to do with the sequel and both men also admit that they questioned whether or not it should be done. We hear that the original idea for a sequel was to film the events of Robert Shaw's speech from the first movie but the studio turned this idea down because they wanted more of the same. We hear about the first director walking off the picture and then Jeannot Szware talks about getting the job and his ideas for the film. Production manager Joe Alves is also on hand as is screenwriter Carl Gottlieb. At just under an hour there's no question that this thing doesn't cover the entire movie and it's a shame so many cast members weren't interviewed but with that said what is here is pretty entertaining for fans of the film. One really gets a great idea of what Hollywood is like as they didn't want to do a "good" movie but instead the studio was just interested in making money and they wanted something the same as the first. The director and screenwriter comment on new ideas they wanted for the film including a breakdown of the kill scenes as well as giving the shark its famous scar. It seems everyone involved are happy with the end result and especially since they had many problems during the production. Best of all is that we get to see some of the deleted scenes from the film including the original helicopter attack under the water, which was cut because the producers needed a PG rating.

This documentary created especially for the DVD version of JAWS 2 is an excellent source for information on the making of this moderately successful 1978 sequel. It is a shame, however, that the only cast member to give insight is Keith Gordon. It would have been nice to see Roy Scheider, Lorraine Gary, Jeffrey Kramer, Ann Dusenberry and others provide some comments as well. Still, director Jeannot Szwarc, producers Richard D. Zanuck and David Brown and screenwriter Carl Gottlieb provide some excellent production stories to help make up for it. Grade : B

That guy up there seems to have not watched it. When does Jeannot Szwarc state that his movie is better than JAWS? The guy continually praises Spielberg and the first movie throughout the documentary.

It's a good piece, with David Brown and Richard Zanuck, as well as Joe Alves (who went on to direct JAWS 3-D). There's a little about the ill-fated JAWS 3, PEOPLE 0, although probably all we'll get is this, as I doubt Universal are ready to shell out for a documentary on the third movie. Shame, really, it has an interesting history.

The accompanying documentary on this disc about John Williams is also very good. Let's hope in the future Universal can continue this kind of support for B-movies, and release some of their classics, like TARANTULA! and THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN.

Interesting doc about the whole production of Jaws 2 with a long interviews with the producers, director and some characters, aside all technical produtions, the most important information is about Murray Hamilton who had suddenly left the movie to care of his wife in hospital whose had some suspicious of brain's cancer, He was gently asking by producer David Brown to given more two days to re-schedule the entire production in effort to finish your remains scenes to set him free, sadly who willing to die wasn't his wife, he died before the movie come out, your wife survives...

Resume:

First watch: 2017 / How many: 1 / Source: DVD / Rating: 7

Just yesterday I picked up a "JAWS/ Jaws 2" DVD combo pack for $29.99, with both films on newly remastered DVDs with tons of bonus features, including deleted scenes, outtakes, trailers, ad campaigns, and two documentaries. On disc "JAWS" you get a doc. with Steven Spielberg, Roy Scheider, Richard Dreyfuss and more commenting on the process of making the film.

On the "Jaws2" disc (the "2" seems to not be spaced in the title, so it looks like "Jaws2" instead of "Jaws 2"), there is another documentary. This one isn't nearly as interesting than the first with Spielberg, mainly because the second film was so average and it's not that interesting to see a documentary on something so average.

The director mainly comments on this film (big surprise), and he seems very full of himself. He seems to think his film is better than Spielberg's original--he's pretty far off the mark, actually.

I won't get into why I disliked the film (it was okay, but nothing great), but I'll say that regardless of what the film was like, this documentary is well put together. Unfortunately, because the film is so darn average, it's hard to take a liking to this documentary.

How are we supposed to be interested in something that wasn't interesting at all?

3/5 stars -

John Ulmer