It was Day 3 of “Amity Homecoming Weekend” on Martha’s Vineyard, and like thousands of other “Jaws” superfans celebrating the movie’s 50th anniversary on the island where it was filmed, David Scanlon was living his dream.
Scanlon, 30, of Savannah, Ga., has loved “Jaws” since his first viewing, at age 3, from which he somehow emerged more enchanted than petrified. At 10, he begged his mother to take him to Martha’s Vineyard, seven miles off Cape Cod in Massachusetts, for the 30th-anniversary festivities. “Not this time,” she had told him. “We’ll go for the 50th.”
And so it was that Scanlon and his mother — along with his sister, brother-in-law and 15-month-old nephew, Georgie — sat by the sparkling harbor on Sunday afternoon, steps from a replica of the Orca, the fishing boat where the movie’s terrifying climax unfolds, savoring an experience two decades in the making.
“It’s a perfect film,” Scanlon said, “and from a very young age, you understand that — long before you have any technical understanding of why.”
The anniversary festivities on the Vineyard included a jam-packed schedule of V.I.P. meet-and-greets, book signings, film screenings, and lectures about sharks and the movie’s history. At the Martha’s Vineyard Museum, a “Jaws” exhibit included one of the battle-scarred yellow barrels that the movie’s giant great white shark dragged into the depths.
There were limited-edition “Jaws” doughnuts and cocktails to sample, and a dizzying array of merch to buy, including a $40, apricot-scented commemorative candle called “Chrissie’s Last Swim,” in honor of the movie shark’s first victim.
But for many who traveled long distances to be there, the real draw was the island itself: the sweeping, grass-fringed beaches and postcard-perfect villages they had come to know and love from repeated viewings of the director Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster breakthrough, which was released in theaters on June 20, 1975.
Michael Robert Anderson, 33, a filmmaker from Staten Island who credits his career choice to the influence of “Jaws” and Spielberg, said he found it deeply cathartic to finally see the movie scenery that felt as familiar as his own neighborhood. Touring the island, he referred to stills from the film that he had downloaded on his phone, and snapped a matching photo of his own in each location.
Most looked much as they did in the movie, he said, a likeness that amazed him as he walked through modern-day Edgartown, the stand-in for the movie’s fictional village of Amity Island.
“This is almost like coming to the set, and the set’s still here,” Anderson said. “You’re just waiting to hear Steven Spielberg say, ‘The shark’s not working!’”
(The mechanical shark in the movie, nicknamed Bruce, frequently broke down, which was one reason that the 1974 shoot ran 100 days over schedule.)
A. Bowdoin Van Riper, the research librarian at the Martha’s Vineyard Museum, believes that some of the film’s power derives from its grounding in a real place, and its casting of hundreds of islanders as extras and in speaking roles. When it became a smash, and then a classic, local pride grew “that we, our island, had been part of making it happen,” he said.
Mr. Van Riper was there that summer, an 11-year-old extra in a beach scene where a crowd of panicked swimmers flees the water. Studying the movie for the past five decades, he has never been able to spot himself.
Speaking at the museum on Sunday, Joe Alves, the movie’s production designer, described how he initially set out to scout locations on the island of Nantucket, 30 miles offshore. His ferry turned back to Cape Cod because of bad weather, but the ferry to the Vineyard — much closer to land — was still running, so he went there instead.
“When I saw Edgartown, I said, ‘This is perfect,’” Alves recalled. “A perfect little village for a shark to destroy.”
Previously a quiet, rural retreat, frequented mostly by New Englanders, the Vineyard grew into a busier, higher-end destination in part because of the exposure “Jaws” gave it. To some, the movie deserves a share of blame for what they consider unwelcome changes.
On Sunday, as guests mingled at a V.I.P. reception on the museum lawn, Patricia Pachico, 65, a lifelong island resident, sat with a friend at the bar two miles away at V.F.W. Post 9261. Both expressed some resentment of the crowds and traffic that the movie’s success spawned.
“It’s not our island anymore,” Pachico said. “It’s ‘Jaws’ Island now.”
The most arduous — and dangerous — 50th-anniversary tribute was that of Lewis Pugh, a British endurance swimmer, who swam 60 miles around the island over 12 days last month to raise awareness about global shark hunting, and declining shark populations, which threaten ocean ecosystems.
Like Spielberg in 1974, Pugh and his support team tapped the expertise of local fishermen to help them navigate the rocky coast in weather conditions that ranked among the worst the veteran swimmer has faced.
“We’ve always had a cardinal rule that we never speak about sharks,” Pugh said in an interview. “But this time, I wanted to speak about sharks, and reshape the narrative about them, the culture of fear that ‘Jaws’ has shaped for 50 years.”
(Pugh, 55, who has never rewatched “Jaws” since his first viewing, did not spot any sharks during his Vineyard swim.)
For some swimmers at Vineyard beaches last weekend, sharks were not the primary source of fear. Liah Camacho, 9, who grew up on the island, instead battled her dread of deep water as she sought to make her first leap off the “Jaws Bridge,” so called because it appears in the film.
Standing on the top rail of the wooden fence along the bridge, which was caked with sand and darkened by damp footprints, she gazed at the water some 15 feet below.
“My legs are shaking,” she said softly, dark ponytail dripping. “Why am I so scared?”
Twice, she retreated from her perch atop the railing. On her third try, as her dad treaded water in the current far below, Liah closed her eyes and jumped.
Instantly transformed into an old pro, she resurfaced and began yelling encouragement to her brother on the bridge above: “It’s not that scary, Carter — you can do it!”
Two days earlier, on the Friday night that marked 50 years since “Jaws” debuted in theaters, Scanlon, the fan from Savannah, had marked another kind of milestone. In a hotel room in Raynham, Mass., en route to the Vineyard, he sat his 15-month-old nephew on his lap and showed him “Jaws” for the first time.
The baby had been mesmerized, the family said, watching it twice through without a peep.
“He won’t remember it, but we will,” Scanlon said. “It was quite a moment.”
Audience Report is a series that looks at people looking. Produced by Jolie Ruben and Amanda Webster.
Jenna Russell is the lead reporter covering New England for The Times. She is based near Boston.
The post Audience Report: Celebrating 50 Years of ‘Jaws’ on Martha’s Vineyard appeared first on New York Times.
