Jaws 3-D (1983) Review

Jaws 3-D (1983) Review

Jaws 3-D tried to distance itself from Jaws 2 with a fresh setting and new batch of victims—I mean, new cast of characters—but it resulted in what I think is actually the worst of the four Jaws movies. While Jaws 2 is genuinely entertaining at points, and Jaws: The Revenge is so-bad-it’s-good, Jaws 3-D is mostly just bad.  

First off, the 3-D gimmick. It reeked of desperation then, and it reeks of desperation now. The opening moments feature the shark (unseen, just like the opening of every Jaws movie) kill a large fish, and its severed head floats toward the camera. This visual trick is just the first of many truly terrible optical effects. Then the credits begin, done in exaggerated 3-D lettering. There are numerous lame 3-D shots, and the cinematography from beginning to end is poor. I suspect this was a result of being filmed in 3-D.  

SeaWorld has a new underwater attraction: a great white shark, which kills several people before being captured. The shark is pretty small, though, so they keep it, hoping it will be the first great white to be kept in captivity. But, as it turns out, there’s another, much larger (and hungrier) great white stalking the waters of the aquatic theme park, which was the real threat all along. It’s a pretty bogus plot. 

The characters are incredibly dull, and so are the actors. Dennis Quaid plays adult Mike Brody and Bess Armstrong plays his girlfriend, a marine biologist, and they are not good. Allegedly, Dennis Quaid was high on cocaine in every frame of the movie; maybe that explains some of it. I’d also lay a lot of the blame on the director, Joe Alves, who previously was the production designer on Jaws and Jaws 2. While the direction isn’t incompetent by any stretch, I still don’t think he was deserving of the promotion. 

The bigger, killer shark is said to be 35 feet, making it the biggest of the Jaws sharks. It also happens to be the slowest-swimming. Most of the time it’s on screen, it’s either cruising along, or just kind of floating there (note: real sharks can’t float). Perhaps the only scene I actually enjoy in this movie is when a guy gets eaten and it’s shown from inside the shark’s mouth, which is pretty cool and horrific. The shark doesn’t make any other impressive kills, and actually has the lowest body count of the four movies. The mechanical shark effects are even worse than the previous movie (in one shot, it’s even done in Claymation), and there is arguably the worst shot in the entire franchise, in which the shark slowly torpedoes into an underwater glass window. 

Jaws 3-D is short on thrills, looks bad in multiple ways, and is all-around pitiful. They even end it with the shark blowing up just like the original, which is annoying, but the added effect of it being in 3-D makes it even more annoying. In spite of all its flaws, it’s still worth watching at least once, just for all the meme-worthy moments that happen throughout.