Martha's Vineyard Jaws | Vineyard Gazette

Filming of Jaws, 1974

Edith Blake

For Jaws, Some Progress — For the 400, an Ice Water Romp

Edith Blake | Friday, July 12 1974 - 9:40am

“We’ll go again,” said the assistant director, Tom Joyner, and into the valley of death waded The 400 with cameras to the right of them, and cameras to the left of them.

The water was cold, cold, cold, and what sunshine there was was most uncooperative. It was Sunday, the last day of June, and really not an ideal day to spend (all of it, every last bit of it) on the beach. The leftover northeast winds were still onshore and so were about 600 people.

Jaws

Up Close With Jaws

Jaws: Memories from Martha’s Vineyard is making its debut trip to the wider world on Tuesday, June 21 at the West Tisbury Public Library. The project, a massive undertaking featuring an exhaustive and engaging collection of pictures and stories from the making of the movie Jaws, was created by Matt Taylor and Jim Beller. It is magnificent.

Once Bitten: Islanders Reveal More Jaws

Peter Brannen

Much has been said and written about the filming of Jaws and its impact in the spring and summer of 1974 on a still relatively obscure fishing and agricultural tourist redoubt seven miles off the southeast coast of Massachusetts. After Jaws: Memories from Martha’s Vineyard there is simply nothing left to be said.

Jaws Returns to Show Lives Shaped by Film

Megan Dooley

The U.S. Coast Guard issued an unprecedented warning to swimmers and boaters a week ago: beware of the great white shark.

Jaws Camera Man Shares Screen Favorites

Cooper Davis

Thomas Bena, founder of the Martha’s Vineyard Film Festival, stood in front of a mostly full house at the Chilmark community center last Wednesday night, and shared an anecdote.

“I can remember one night a few years ago when a man approached me on his way out the door. He told me that he appreciated what we were doing here, but that the film we had just shown was repetitive and just generally not very good. I thanked him for his thoughts and was watching him leave when someone else came up to me and said ‘Do you know who that guy was?’”

Jaws Author’s Widow Pleads for End to Shark Tournament

Jim Hickey

It was 35 years ago that Peter Benchley’s novel Jaws, about a great white shark that terrorizes a resort town, was first published, starting a run of 44 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and inspiring the Steven Spielberg film of the same name, filmed off the shores of Martha’s Vineyard.

This week the novelist’s widow, Wendy Benchley, made a visit to the Oak Bluffs selectmen to take aim at what has become, in recent years, a focal point in the battle over shark conservation: the annual Oak Bluffs Monster Shark Tournament.

Netflix Eyes Oak Bluffs for August Screening of Blockbuster Jaws

James Kinsella

The ominous, quickening strains that can mean only one thing - the shark is near and getting nearer - are slated to fill Ocean Park in Oak Bluffs at an August 5 open-air screening of Jaws.

Netflix, a company that operates a DVD mail rental service, has applied to the Oak Bluffs Park Commission to show the movie at the park off Seaview avenue. Admission would be free. The commission was scheduled to vote on the application last night.