BEAST OF WAR: A Solid Slab of Sharksploitation

BEAST OF WAR (Blu-ray)

2025 / 87 min

Well Go USA

Review by Mr. Bonnie, the Bigger Boat😸

Ah…another day, another low budget shark movie.

I generally don’t mind reviewing these things, because even the bad ones (which is most of ‘em) are usually good for a few shits & giggles, often at their own expense. And like many of you, I never go in expecting another Jaws because that’s never gonna happen.

Beast of War hails from Australia and purports to be “based on a true story.” Fans of ferocious fish probably don’t care how much of the “true” part ends up in the movie, as long as there’s plenty of shark action, which this one eventually serves up in abundance.

I say eventually because the first act takes time to introduce its main characters. Set during World War II, a squad of new recruits are training for an upcoming mission. Leo (David Coles Smith) is an indigenous Australian haunted by a past tragedy involving a shark, Will (Joel Nankervis) is a smart but inexperienced young man who Leo takes under his wing, and Des (Sam Delich) is a racist, self-aggrandizing bully. Though other characters mostly exist to be fish food, the narrative does an excellent job fleshing out these three, assuring that we’re invested in their survival…or horrible deaths. 

A Farewell to Arm.

On the way to the mission, the troop’s ship is torpedoed by Japanese forces and sinks, stranding a half-dozen survivors on a slab of debris in the middle of the Pacific. They have little food and no fresh water, but their more immediate concern lurks under the surface: a great white shark that might just be the hungriest fish in movie history, relentlessly stalking these guys and putting the bitedown on anyone unfortunate enough to end up in the water.

Because bad shark movies far outweigh the good ones, I kept waiting for Beast of War to descend into silliness or stupidity, but it never does. Though there are lapses in plausibility, it was around the halfway point that I found myself thinking, Hey, this is actually pretty good. Sometimes really good, in fact. In addition to engaging characters and decent overall performances, writer-director Kiah Roache-Turner manages to create plenty of tension and atmosphere despite obvious budgetary limitations. Best of all, this one doesn’t appear to rely too much on CGI. The shark isn’t always convincing, but at least we feel it’s physically sharing the screen with the cast. Additionally, the attack scenes are brutal and bloody, punctuated by pretty realistic gore effects. 

I don’t know much much of this true story is actually true, nor do I care. What ultimately matters is that Beast of War is a surprisingly solid slab of sharksploitation. Running a lean 87 minutes, it benefits from a brisk pace, and other than an amusing aside depicting how these guys manage to solve their thirst problem, a mostly serious approach to its premise.

Lambcast #775: JAWS 50th Anniversary Celebration

What 50th Anniversary celebration would be complete without a podcast about the greatest movie ever made? Richard Kirkham hosts this lengthy (but well worth it) discussion of Jaws, featuring personal insights, anecdotes and opinions from Howard Casner, Jay Cluitt, Nicole Ayers, Aaron Neuwirth, Amanda Kirkham and your furry friends at FREE KITTENS. 

LISTEN HERE:

Lambcast #775 Jaws :50th Anniversary Celebration

JAWS at 50: Kitten Collectibles #13

A Treasure Hunt by D.M. ANDERSON

In addition to watching and writing about films, I’m something of a memorabilia collector. Cursed with a teacher’s salary, I ain’t out there bidding on Dorothy’s ruby slippers or anything, but certainly enjoy haunting local shops for a variety of movie-related stuff. Or when feeling particularly bold, I’ll occasionally overpay for some retro relic on eBay. More often than not, I leave stores empty-handed. But every now and then, I’ll find a small treasure that doesn’t completely empty my wallet and give it a new home in the Dave Cave.

Since 1975, my favorite movie has always been Jaws, and most people I know are well-aware of that. While I don’t go through my day telling everyone I encounter that it’s the greatest movie of all time, there are always signs…

I suppose it goes without saying that I’ve also got a shit-ton of Jaws related merch and collectibles…from action figures to Lego sets to die cast vehicles. But alas, none of it is actually from the ‘70s, either because it’s too hard to find or my wife won’t allow me to mortgage the house for the original Jaws game. 

Then during my last year of teaching before retirement, one of my students arrived before class and gave me this…

She and her parents became aware of my love for Jaws during conferences (there were signs in my classroom, too). And apparently, this old relic had been sitting in their garage for decades. 

There was a lot of tie-in merchandise related to Jaws during the ‘70s, but I had no idea that a line of skateboards baring its logo even existed. Doing a bit of digging online, I learned the original Jaws skateboards were available in a variety of colors, and you can still find them if you’re willing to pay enough. Somewhat ironically, the rarest item in my Jaws collection didn’t cost me a penny. 

I was deeply touched that a student and her parents thought of me instead of discarding it…probably the closest I’ve ever gotten to a Mr. Holland moment during my teaching career. Needless to say, I didn’t try riding it. I wasn’t all that great of a skater even back in the day. At my age, not only would I look supremely silly, my wife probably would’ve ended up calling 911 after I faceplanted on the driveway.

JAWS at 50: 20 Degrees of JAWSome

20 Degrees of JAWSome!

There are two types of people…those who think Jaws is the greatest movie of all time and those who are wrong. With that in mind, Free Kittens humbly offers a few personal (and very subjective) reasons why the film remains totally Jawsome…even 50 years later.

Jaws features cinema’s greatest happy accident. Because the mechanical shark built for the film kept breaking down, director Steven Spielberg was forced to come up with creative ways to get around actually showing it, which ended up making it scarier.

The movie remains culturally relevant. Its iconic title logo and poster art still inspire gobs of merchandise…T-shirts, games, toys, action figures, models, shoes, coffee cups, wine, blankets, towels, artwork and a really bitchin’ pinball machine.

The two most recognizable notes in soundtrack music history, even if you’ve never seen the movie.

You’d be hard pressed to name another single movie that’s been ripped off more often…and is still being ripped off. 

One of those rare films that’s a lot better than the book it’s based on. Peter Benchley’s novel is terrible, loaded with dull subplots, unlikable characters and a shitty ending. Even Hank Searls’ novelization of Jaws 2 is a better read.

In the scene where Quint (Robert Shaw) and Hooper (Richard Dreyfuss) are comparing scars, there’s a brief shot of Chief Brody (Roy Scheider) starting to lift his shirt to share a scar of his own, but then changes his mind. Since he was a New York City cop just before moving his family to comparatively quiet Amity Island, his somber, self-conscious expression suggests the scar might be the result of getting wounded in the line of duty (hence the Brodys’ move to Amity). Or hell, maybe he just had his appendix removed. The point is there’s always been more to Jaws than a ravenous shark, even during the inconsequential, understated moments.

Jaws is so well made that we all happily overlooked the fact that the shark isn’t the actual villain.

The greatest monologue ever filmed (Quint’s account of the ill-fated U.S.S. Indianapolis).

Inspired a stage play, The Shark is Broken, co-written by Ian Shaw, Robert’s son. Ian also played the role of Quint in the play. 

For some of us, it’s the first time we saw a naked lady in a movie! PG was a lot different in those days.

Who cares if you probably can’t blow up a 25-foot shark by shooting a scuba tank lodged in its mouth? This ain’t a documentary!

The “dolly zoom” of Brody’s reaction to the attack on Alex Kintner is one of the greatest single shots I've ever seen. Hitchcock may have done it first (for Vertigo), but Spielberg did it best.

A third of the U.S. population saw Jaws in theaters when it was released. Taking inflation into account, it is still the seventh biggest movie of all time.

While photographing the shark, Hooper trying to coerce Brody to step out onto the boat’s bowsprit in order to give the picture some scale is comedy gold. 

Roy Scheider’s performance was Oscarworthy. So was Robert Shaw's. Fuck the Academy.

Speaking of acting…Despite not being professional actors, Spielberg got really good performances from some the locals of Martha’s Vineyard (where much of Jaws was shot).

Inspired a generation of teenagers to try chugging an entire beer and crushing the can with their hand (this was before cans were made of aluminum).

When Ben Gardner’s head popped out of the hole in his boat with an eye missing, I’m pretty sure I broke the world record for the farthest anyone has ever accidentally thrown a bucket of popcorn.

And I also think my kid sister broke that short-lived record when she came with me the second time I went to see it.

“You’re gonna need a bigger boat.” Who doesn’t know that line?

JAWS at 50: Richard’s Personal JAWStory

Richard’s Personal JAWStory

By Richard Kirkham

Kirkham A Movie A Day

Richard Kirkham tirelessly writes about every movie he sees in theaters on his blog, A Movie A Day. He is also the operator and frequent podcast host at The Lamb (Large Association of Movie Blogs), which is the world’s largest movie blogging community. Richard was kind enough to share his own experience seeing Jaws for the first time…

Those of us who lived through the phenomena that was and is Jaws can never look back without thinking how it changed us. Those who came after can never live in a world where Jaws did not influence the way movies are made and marketed. Any one who lived before Jaws knows how it changed the movie world, and looking back on summer movies will be a nostalgia of a different order because Jaws is in your world now.

Some might think that this is hyperbole, but the number of films, filmmakers, academics, marketers and film-goers who have been influenced by this movie is undeniable. I have actually read on line comments that dismiss Jaws and suggest it is somehow just a footnote in film making history. If editing is a footnote, if the addition of sound and color to films are footnotes, if the study of film as an artistic medium is a footnote, then maybe they are right. (BUT THEY ARE NOT!!!) The combination of story, director, script, acting and especially marketing created the modern world of film. There may be some negative consequences (like Shrek 4 opening on 4000 screens), but the variety of stories and film-making that have resulted from Jaws is just undeniable. This is the gold standard.

I saw Jaws on opening day in the Summer of 1975, with my friend Dan Hasegawa. Dan and I went to the Hasting's Ranch Theaters, three moderately sized screens located just north of the big Pacific Theater Hasting's Theater. We knew next to nothing about the film except what was shown in the trailer. The trailer gives you a good impression of the action and adventure that is coming your way, but I think it undersells the horror aspect and that is what we were most surprised about. From the beginning cello strokes and underwater POV shot, we are creeped out. It still did not prepare us for the intense opening sequence that everybody held their breath through. Later in the movie, I literally saw 500 people sink into their seats in dread and then jump out of the seat, simultaneously. I am not exaggerating…the audience levitated at least a foot out of their seats when Ben Gardner appears. There have been gotcha moments in films for years; Alan Arkin's dying leap for a blind Audrey Hepburn or Carrie grabbing poor Amy Irving's arm are those kinds of jumps. This made them all look quaint by comparison. I had seen The Exorcist a couple of years earlier, after it had been talked about and described to me for months. It was still frightening and made me jump, but that was despite what I knew was coming. Here, we did not know what was going to happen, and after that first scene it seemed like anything was possible. Amanda has seen this movie maybe more than other movie in her life and she still covers her eyes for a few scenes.

Hasting's Ranch Theater in the 1970s.

The movie is so much more than a horror film, however. This is a struggle of a family man to cope with the inadequacies that plague him, it is the story of a place that defines itself as a paradise, suddenly being stripped of it's self concept. Most of all, it is the story of a quest by an Ahab like character for vengeance against the monsters that have defined him for the thirty years since his own encounter with the Great White Whale. Quint is the greatest movie character ever prior to 1980. He is memorable for his tics, dialogue and the performance of a great actor whose work in this movie was not properly recognized by any critics groups of the time. If you were to ask people, what great supporting actor role performance they remember from any time in the 1970s, Robert Shaw in Jaws will be mentioned. I'll bet that none of the five other actors nominated for Academy Awards that year would make the top fifty mentions on that standard. The monologue that Quint delivers on the Orca, about the U.S.S. Indianapolis, is without a doubt one of the greatest scenes in movie history. It stands beside Micheal's kiss in Godfather Part 2, Kane's rage in Citizen Kane, and even the airport scene in Casablanca. Robert Shaw re-wrote the dialog for himself, and his delivery, starting off with a self knowing smirk, transforming to a terrified memory and finishing off with a self-deluding smile and bit of panache, is something I would imagine every actor now looks at with awe. I am not an expert on performance, but this whole scene seemed real, every bit of it.

JAWS At 50: "Rycke's Personal JAWStory"

Rycke’s Personal JAWStory

By Rycke Foreman

Rycke Foreman is an author, filmmaker and longtime friend of Free Kittens. He was kind enough to share his own experience seeing Jaws for the first time…

I saw it for the first time when I was about 5 years old. We lived in Forth Worth, Texas, and I'm pretty sure we saw it in a second-run theater. I was as fascinated as I was scared; afterwards, I was afraid "Jaws" (as I'd call the shark) was going to break up through my bathtub and get me while I was bathing.

When it made its TV debut a year or two later, I made sure to watch it again, and that inspired me to make my first attempt at writing a story. It was awful and totally plagiarized the movie. I had forgotten it, but my mother sent a photocopied version to me at some point, so I was able to re-read it. It was hard to follow what was going on, exactly, but it was all dialog, no action. "Roy" and "Richard" had fallen into the water, and were screaming to each other how they needed to get back on the boat, fast, because they were scared that Jaws was going to eat them.

During Junior High School, I watched it more than 100 times. Years later, I eventually wrote a Jaws spoof as a novel, with a lead character named Roy. I don't really pay attention, but I think it is my best selling book. (Maybe a hundred copies out there.) Also, to this day, I have a hard time setting foot in the ocean--step past the knee and quietly, subtly, the first "dun dun" echoes through the back of my mind. Which is all a roundabout way of saying that Jaws is by and far the most influential film in my life.

JAWS at 50: "A Personal JAWStory"

A Personal JAWStory

By D.M. Anderson

It’s hard to believe Jaws is turning 50 this year. It was a watershed moment in movie history and I remember it like it was yesterday. If you weren’t around in the summer of 1975, you can’t imagine the impact it had on everybody. Not just audiences, but on popular culture. The first true summer blockbuster, Jaws scared the bejeezus out of damn near everybody, so much that many won’t even venture into the ocean to this day (including yours truly).

To kick off Free Kittens Movie Guide’s celebration of Jaws’ Anniversary, I thought I’d share my own recollections of seeing it for the first time. The movie may be turning 50, but my personal Jaws-iversary is about 49.5 years because it was months before my mother agreed to let me see it.

I was 11 when Jaws opened in three local Portland theaters, the Southgate Quad, Town Center Tri-Cinema and the Foster Road Drive-In (all of which are now long gone). Based on all the TV spots, newspaper ads and the enthusiasm of my friends who saw it first, Jaws was numero uno on my gotta-see list. 

Mom shot down those plans pretty swiftly. “Absolutlely not. A friend at work told me a dog gets eaten, and a dead man is floating in the water with no eyes.”

This was still a few years before defying her authority was an option. I was heartbroken. There it was, the mother of all movies, the cinematic Holy Grail playing at the Southgate theater only five miles away, rendered forbidden fruit by my mother. Sure, I knew the whole story already, regaled by friends whose parents had no objections to letting them see it. But because it was rendered off limits, Jaws became the only movie I wanted to see. In ensuing months, I would occasionally beg Mom again, hoping she’d change her mind, but was always met with a stern no. She’d offer the same reason almost every time: “That’s not the kind of movie a kid should see.”

On rare occasions when I felt brave, I’d counter with, “But it’s rated PG. You’ve let me watch PG movies before, like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.”

“Butch Cassidy never devoured the Sundance Kid,” she said, probably proud of her response. “Jaws is a horror movie, and you’re not going to see a horror movie about a fish that eats people. It‘ll give you nightmares.”

The Oregonian's ad for Jaws on opening day, June 20, 1975.

It was at this time I’d usually sulk back to my room, not understanding her reasoning. I’d watched lots of horror movies before, but for some reason she had a problem with Jaws. And with my limited debating skills, I was unable to convey how much it meant to me to actually see a fish eat people.

Then in November, on my 12th birthday, Mom finally decided it was okay for me to invite a couple of friends to see Jaws at the Southgate Quad. I’m still not sure what prompted her sudden change-of-heart. Perhaps it was Dad’s idea, thinking it would be nice for he and Mom to have the house to themselves for a few hours (which didn’t happen often). If that was the case…eew.

By this time, the film had been out for six months. Everyone else and their dog had already seen it, including my two friends, but that didn’t matter. After months of hype and hearing everything second-hand, I finally got to see this pop culture phenomenon for myself.

The Southgate Quad Cinema, where Jaws played for almost a year in Portland, Oregon.

And just in case anyone reading this is like my mother and has never seen it…Jaws takes place in the fictional coastal town of Amity (in real life, Martha’s Vineyard), where a 25-foot great white shark starts attacking swimmers. In order to save this vacation town from financial ruin, sheriff Martin Brody (Roy Scheider), shark expert Matt Hooper (Richard Dreyfuss) and loony charter captain Quint (Robert Shaw) set out on a rickety fishing boat to kill the shark. That’s the movie in a nutshell, and while it doesn’t sound like much on paper, the story is so masterfully told that it rightfully made a superstar out of young director Steven Spielberg. We don’t even see the shark until about halfway through, which made it even scarier (it has been well-documented that the decision not to show the animal too much stemmed from the fact the mechanical shark broke down pretty often).

The final act (onboard the fishing boat) is still one of the most relentless and entertaining third acts ever made. And who really cares if you can’t actually blow up a three ton shark by shooting the scuba tank lodged in its mouth? It’s sure as hell a better ending than the one offered by original Jaws author Peter Benchley, where the shark simply rolls over and dies. By the way, if you never read the original novel, don’t bother. It sucks.

To this day, Jaws is one of the few movies that lived up to all the hype…and then some. We’ve all gotten amped-up to see uber-promoted blockbusters only to walk out of the theater thinking, “So what?” But Jaws was everything I hoped it would be: scary, funny, surprising. It was not the shocking gore-fest Mom feared - only five people are actually killed - and the poor little pooch she was so worried about doesn‘t die onscreen…in fact, it’s only implied that he dies. 

There is that jolting scene of one victim’s head popping at the screen with an eye missing, which scared me so bad my popcorn went flying, but Jaws was always more than just a “gotcha” horror movie (I personally don't consider it a horror movie at all...more of an action-adventure tale that simply happens to make some folks pee their pants). Leaving the theater, I felt like I saw just something special, more than just another flick my parents dropped me off to see while they went shopping (or have the house to themselves...again, eew). In ensuing years, not too many movies gave me that same rush, and the last movie to hit me with the impact of Jaws was Pulp Fiction.

But as my mom feared, the movie did give me nightmares. After coming home from the movie on my 12th birthday, some time during the night I crept into my parents’ room and crawled into bed with them. Man, that guy with his eyeball missing really did freak me out.

Jaws played for damn near a year at the Southgate theater, where I watched it twice. Then when the movie finally made its way to the second-run theaters in town, I caught it three more times (some of you younguns might have to Google ‘second-run theater’). This makes Jaws the movie I’ve seen on the big screen more than any other.

50 years later, I still think it is the greatest film of all time. Sure, like any kid, something shiny & new would come along to briefly takes its place, like Star Wars or Escape from New York or Halloween. But then I’d revisit Jaws again and back to the top of the list it would swim. For me, Jaws isn’t just a great film; it remains a nearly perfect film.