JAWS-Does it Still Have Bite 50 Years Later

JAWS was a major motion picture hit back in the summer of 1975 keeping people off the beaches and audiences screeching at the bloody body parts thanks to a menacing shark.  I was one of the patrons in the theater who lapped up every gory detail and every part of this film a young Steven Spielberg captured on the big screen.  While in New York, I saw the Broadway show, THE SHARK IS BROKEN.  The play has the three leads from the film, Richard Dreyfuss, Roy Scheider and Robert Shaw stuck on the vessel while the menacing shark was undergoing mechanical maintenance.  The three actors bickered, bantered and argued the merits of theater and serious acting as opposed to popular melodrama cinema.  The dialogue was credibly forged as writings by Robert Shaw were kept during the filming.  Shaw's son, Ian Shaw found and developed these notes into a very clever and entertaining play.  So my question is does the splash hit still spike terror or possess strong acting chomps today. The opening of JAWS maintains the look of the 70s throughout and the young ingenue still chews up the screen as we wait for her attractive below water limbs to feel a nimble.  The incredible score was by the brilliant John Williams at the beginning of his burgeoning career. Great start but then the movie falls apart as the dubious n'er do well, mayor wants to sugar coat any threat that would keep tourists from trafficking to Amity for its financial saving season.  The movie stalls on land, especially with the hundreds of extras on the beach.  Learning to herd hundreds of extra must have exasperated Spielberg who couldn't get crowds to convincing flee from the shark infested waters or blend naturally into the background. The slap by the grieving mom to Scheider's face still resounded loudly.  The film finally gets its sea legs when the three actors are left adrift to kill the beast.  Dreyfuss as the smart-mouthed shark expert is put in his place by the wizened, hard drinking Shaw and Scheider finally shows some backbone.  They're interactions are what steer the drama and are far more convincing than the mechanical shark which is less menacing than remembered gnawing on the ship's stern.  Still, the relative novice Spielberg shows star promise as a director.  His choices in camera angles, cast and composer Williams were all brilliant.  The 70s was the epoch of big disaster films.  JAWS remains at the top of this genre with better story telling, character development and special affects.  But, the movie flounders in retrospect.  I suspect Spielberg would tell you he was still honing his craft but bound for bigger and better things to come.