Read up on the latest Jaws news, reviews, features, and more from the ScreenAge Wasteland team.

Directed by Steven Spielberg from a screenplay by Peter Benchley and Carl Gottlieb, Jaws is the first installment in the Jaws franchise. The movie stars Roy Scheider as police chief Martin Brody, who, with the help of a marine biologist (Richard Dreyfuss) and a professional shark hunter (Robert Shaw), hunts a man-eating great white shark that attacks beachgoers at a New England resort town.

Jaws was released on June 20, 1975, by Universal Pictures. The thriller movie is regarded as a turning point in motion picture history, being seen as the prototypical summer blockbuster. Until the release of Star Wars in 1977, Jaws was the highest-grossing film in history with a box office of $193 million.

Jaws was deemed an essential movie and inducted into the ScreenAge Wasteland Canon on July 2, 2020. The movie has also appeared on the following “greatest” lists assembled by ScreenAge Wasteland:

• #1 on The 50 Greatest Movies Turning 50 in 2025
• #1 on The 50 Greatest Summer Blockbusters of All Time
• #2 (Robert Shaw as Quint) on The 100 Biggest Oscar Acting Snubs of All Time
• #3 (Quint), #8 (Chief Martin Brody), and #12 (Bruce the Shark) on The 25 Most Memorable Spielberg Movie Characters
• #4 on The 100 Greatest Horror Movies
• #19 (Ben Gardner’s Boat) and #37 (A Nighttime Swim) on The 100 Scariest Movie Moments of All Time
• #28 (Quint) on The 100 Greatest Horror Characters of All Time
• #29 (Quint), #101 (Bruce the Shark), #114 (Chief Martin Brody), and #161 (Matt Hooper) on The 500 Greatest Horror Characters of All Time
• #56 on The 100 Greatest Movie Teaser Trailers