History Literature / Jaws

[[caption-width-right:350:''"There's nothing in the sea this fish would fear. Other fish run from bigger things. That's their instinct. But this fish doesn't run from anything. He doesn't fear."'']]

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/jaws_4.jpg]]

* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome: The shark at first is depicted as an almost supernatural monster, impervious to gunshots and powerful enough to destroy boats and a shark cage with ease. Even Brody admits that hunting the shark has become a suicide mission after [[spoiler:Hooper got eaten]]. But then on the final day of the shark hunt, shark loses its invincible aura after Quint successfully attaches three barrels on its body. Unlike the film, the shark is unable to dive down to the depths because it lacks the strength to pull three barrels for a long period of time, allowing the Orca to track it with ease. [[spoiler:And these barrels end up exhausting the shark's energy to the point it can no longer swim to keep breathing, causing it to die of suffocation just before it reaches the helpless Brody on the sinking ship.]]

* {{Bowdlerize}}: There's a Literature/LittleGoldenBooks version in which no one dies, not even the shark.

* {{Bowdlerize}}: There's a Literature/LittleGoldenBook version in which no one dies, not even the shark.

A 1974 horror/thriller novel by Creator/PeterBenchley that was adapted into [[Film/{{Jaws}} a 1975 film]] by Creator/StevenSpielberg, said film becoming one of the most iconic of all time and [[TropeMaker single-handedly inventing]] the SummerBlockbuster in the process.

* InternalRetcon: In order to protect Amity's reputation as a tourist resort, its more prominent citizens convince Brody not to close beaches, or even mention anything about the shark, thinking that it will just go away and they can go on with their business as usual. This backfires when it eats a six-year-old boy at the beach, followed by an old man right in plain sight in less than an hour.

* SerialRapist: Before the shark swam into Amity's waters, one of the few major crime cases in there involved a gardener who raped a total of seven rich women, none of which testified against him in court.

* VomitChainReaction: When the remains of Chrissie Watkins, the shark's first victim are found, the cop who made the discovery [[VomitingCop starts vomiting on the spot]]. This is followed by Chrissie's boyfriend who has to identify her, which causes Chief Brody, who had struggled to keep anything in after seeing the body to vomit too.

* MobySchtick: At first, Quint simply sees catching the shark as just another, if well-paying, job. After witnessing the shark [[spoiler: killing Hooper]], he starts obsessing about catching it. [[spoiler: He even dies similarly to Captain Ahab, being dragged underwater by rope and drowning]].

Amity is a quaint small town on Long Island, New York, frequented by rich city tourists in the summer, from whom the locals derive most of their income, getting them through uneventful winters. When a [[ThreateningShark man-eating great white shark]] starts killing people in the waters near its beaches, the fragile economy is threatened; police Chief Martin Brody faces the dilemma of keeping the people safe while facing mounting pressure from the town's mayor – and the people who pull the mayor's strings – to keep the beaches open to salvage something of the tourist season.

The book is divided into three acts; the first act is much like the film, opening directly with the shark's first victim, and proceeding from there, albeit with different emphasis. More attention is given to the conflict between Chief Brody's duty to protect the citizens – by closing the beaches, in his opinion – and the town's need for tourist dollars to get through the lean winters, and to Ellen Brody's identity as a "summer person" and her boredom with her blue-collar life.

The second act was almost entirely cut from the film. It deals with Ellen's extramarital affair with the younger ichthyologist Hooper and Mayor Vaughn's involvement with sharks of a different kind – [[TheMafia mafia]] loan sharks. It also offers a further reflection on just how fragile single-industry small towns are when something disrupts that single industry. The main element from this act to survive the transition to film is the opening of the beaches for the Fourth of July, and even that is handled quite differently.

The second act was almost entirely cut from the film. It deals with Ellen's extramarital affair with the younger ichthyologist Hooper and Mayor Vaughn's involvement with sharks of a different kind – {{Mafia}} loan sharks. It also offers a further reflection on just how fragile single-industry small towns are when something disrupts that single industry. The main element from this act to survive the transition to film is the opening of the beaches for the Fourth of July, and even that is handled quite differently.

Amity is a quaint small town on Long Island, New York, frequented by rich city tourists in the summer, from whom the locals derive most of their income, getting them through uneventful winters. When a [[ThreateningShark man-eating great white shark]] starts killing people in the waters near its beaches, the fragile economy is threatened; police Chief Brody faces the dilemma of keeping the people safe while facing mounting pressure from the town's mayor - and the people who pull the mayor's strings - to keep the beaches open to salvage something of the tourist season.

The book is divided into three acts; the first act is much like the film, opening directly with the shark's first victim, and proceeding from there, albeit with different emphasis. More attention is given to the conflict between Chief Brody's duty to protect the citizens - by closing the beaches, in his opinion - and the town's need for tourist dollars to get through the lean winters, and to Ellen Brody's identity as a "summer person" and her boredom with her blue-collar life.

The second act was almost entirely cut from the film. It deals with Ellen's affair with the younger ichthyologist Hooper and Mayor Vaughn's involvement with sharks of a different kind - mafia loan sharks. It also offers a further reflection on how fragile single-industry small towns are when something disrupts that single industry. The main element from this act to survive the transition to film is the opening of the beaches for the 4th of July, and even that is handled quite differently.

The last act of the book, however, is not so dissimilar, ending with [[spoiler: Brody, the rogue fisherman Quint, and Hooper hunting down the shark aboard Quint's boat, though in the book Hooper dies and the shark's death is somewhat less cinematic]].

[[caption-width-right:350:''There's nothing in the sea this fish would fear. Other fish run from bigger things. That's their instinct. But this fish doesn't run from anything. He doesn't fear.'']]

* BasedOnATrueStory: The novel as well as [[Film/{{Jaws}} the Spielberg movie ]] are both partly-inspired by the real life [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Shore_shark_attacks_of_1916 1916 Jersey Shore shark attacks]].

%%* BaldOfAwesome: Quint.

* BasedOnATrueStory: The novel as well as [[Film/{{Jaws}} the movie of the same name]] are both partly-inspired by the real life [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Shore_shark_attacks_of_1916 1916 Jersey Shore shark attacks]].

* BasedOnATrueStory: The novel as well as [[Film/{{Jaws}} the movie of the same name]] are both likely inspired by the real life [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Shore_shark_attacks_of_1916 1916 Jersey Shore shark attacks]].

* BasedOnATrueStory: The novel as well as [[Film/{{Jaws}} the movie of the same name]] are both likely at least partly-inspired by the real life [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Shore_shark_attacks_of_1916 1916 Jersey Shore shark attacks]].

* BasedOnATrueStory: The novel as well as [[Film/{{Jaws}} the movie of the same name]] are both likely inspired by the real life [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Shore_shark_attacks_of_1916 1916 Jersey Shore shark attacks]].