At the time of a conference held on March 15th, 1978 with the National Film Theater of London, Steven Spielberg known as of the Teeth of the sea which the film seems to him now:

Violent one, malicious and rough. Nothing in this film was personal for me. All was calculated. I made the assembly with jubilation, knowing the effect that would produce on the public. I want to work never again on another film of this kind.

Assertion can to seem abrupt and report bitter, but if it is true that the film received a public and critical reception favorable, it is quite as true to affirm that turning was testing for the realizer, the actors, the producers and the engineering team. The turning of the external sights, which began on May 2nd, 1974, was to finish at the latest on June 25th. However it of it was nothing. It will be prolonged in fact until September 15th, 1974, and in same time, the budget which was initially envisaged to 2,5 million dollars will explode to 12 million dollars.

Production

In 1974, appears the novel Jaws of Peter Benchley. Very quickly, it at the head places sales at the United States and there will remain 44 weeks of at a stretch there, reaching in a few months 9 million sold specimens.

Enough quickly, David Brown and Richard D. Zanuck, the producers of the first feature-length film of Steven Spielberg Sugarland Express train , decide to buy the rights of the book, including/understanding all the cinematographic potential of the novel. For this purpose, it pay: 175000 dollars with the author and require of Benchley to adapt itself Jaws to the screen for 25.000 additional dollars.

It is while returning visit with these producers that Spielberg discovers by chance a specimen of the novel, as it will explain it itself:

One day, whereas I was in the office of the producers of Sugarland Express , I saw several sets of tests of a book to be appeared: Jaws (in French “jaws”). I said myself that was to be a history of dentist! |Matter of Steven Spielberg collected by the magazine '' Première '', n°114 of September 1986 and taken again by the n°357 of November 2006, p.26.

After having read the work, it decides to carry it out. Because like it specifies it itself, it found in the novel an echo with its own fears:

All that I know of the ocean, it is that I always was afraid of it. I was the ideal candidate to direct the Teeth of the sea . I wondered why. I excavated in my memories and I found. I was to have 3 or 4 years; one lived in the New Jersey and, with my father, one went in Atlantic City every weekend. I remember that it took me along in water and held me above its head when the waves arrived. I very felt safe in his arms. And there was this wave, higher. My father released me, I collapsed, and I swallowed salt water… I have a very sharp memory at the same time of the confidence which I tested in the arms of my father and, simultaneously, of the treason of nature tearing off me with my father to throw itself under water. I believe that my desire to make the Teeth of the sea comes me from there|Matter of Steven Spielberg collected in November 1996 by Jacques-Andre Bondy and Alain Kruger for the magazine First

In the months which follow, Peter Benchley written three grindings of the scenario which do not convince. It leaves then to the Cannes festival, the meeting of the producers and Spielberg which came to present Sugarland Express in official competition, where the film will be rewarded for the price of the scenario. Then it flies away for Bermuda where it begins the drafting of its new novel, deep seas ( The Deep ).

The team then starts to be concerned. It misses a scenario and time presses, the Screen Actors Guild threat to call with the strike starting from June 28th, 1974 and no studio would engage in a project whose turning would be prolonged beyond this date.

The production of film thus get going. the Teeth of the sea is initially budgeted for to 2,5 million dollars, which is little vis-a-vis the 5 million budget of the Adventure of Poséidon (Ronald Neame, 1972) or to the 14 million the infernal Tower (John Guillermin and Irwin Allen, 1974), films catastrophes in the vein of film of Spielberg. But at the beginning, it is not envisaged any optical or mechanical effect particular.

On its side, Steven Spielberg contacts the engineering team of Sugarland Express , hoping well to employ again it to the maximum on its new project. He convinces the decorator Joe Alves, future realizer of the Dents of sea 3, the director of production Bill Gillmore and the régisseuse one of distribution Shari Rhodos. The Chief operator Vilmos Zsigmond being inalienable, Spielberg called upon Bill Butler with which it had worked on the telefilms Something Evil (1972) and Savage (1973).

It takes again also Verna Fields which with the advantage of being relatively close to Ned Tanen, at the time president d' Universal Pictures. It was also at the time committed on the project of musical comedy of Peter Bogdanovich, Enfin the love ( At Long Last Love ) which will be finally assembled by Douglas Robertson and will leave in 1975.

It is then necessary to consider a faster progression in the writing of the scenario. However, a few years before, Zanuck a project remained had had abortive: to adapt for the 20th Century Fox, the play of Howard Sackler on the black boxer Jack Johnson, The Great White Hope ( the insurrectionist ). He thus entrusts the responsibility to him to intervene on the scenario of Benchley and Gottlieb, with the manner of a Script doctor. Not wishing to be credited, Sackler will be locked up one month with the hotel Beautiful-Air of Los Angeles for récrire certain scenes. With John Milius, it will write the 1st version of the monolog of Quint, concerning the shipwreck of the USS Indianapolis . Occurred on July 30th, 1945, it put at the sea 900 sailors during 5 days, including one certain number finished devoured by the sharks. The monolog will be finally improved by Robert Shaw itself, so as to be more compact, percussion.

The principal place of turning is fixed at Martha's Vineyard because of weak the Marée S and of the shallow waters near the beaches which will make it possible to film all the day.

Remain the problem of the shark. How to insert in film of the realistic sights of the animal, given that which it is not obvious to film a shark and impossible to make evolve/move actors at its sides.

Part of this dilemma will be solved by the underwater sights of truths sharks, turned by the animalist photographers Ron and Valerie Taylor in Dangerous Reef in South Australia. The sights were used in the scene where Matt Hooper is locked up in a cage with the shark around him. As truths sharks did not measure 7 meters as wished by Spielberg, it was decided to make double Richard Dreyfuss by a dwarf in a small cage, thus giving the illusion which the filmed shark is taller than it is it actually. The man in question is called Carl Rizzo and measurement 1,45 Mr.

Then, Joe Alves puts himself in the search of somebody whom can build false mechanical sharks and finds it in the person of Robert A. Mattey, the creator of the octopus of {{formatnum: 20000}} miles under the seas (Richard Fleischer, 1954). At that time, the film already exceeded the 3 million dollars of budget.

Whereas Carl Gottlieb is called to finalize the scenario, the choices of casting are distinct. Roy Scheider, which has been just pointed out in French Connection of William Friedkin (1971), will camp Martin Brody, and Matt Hooper will be incarnated by Richard Dreyfuss. For the role of Quint, it is Sterling Hayden which is approximate in first, actor who had been distinguished in When the city sleeps of John Huston (1950) or the Ultimate Raid of Stanley Kubrick (1956). But it cannot accept having contentions with the Internal Revenue Service in connection with a history of unpaid taxes. The role is finally offered against: 100000 dollars with Robert Shaw which was pointed out the previous year by its interpretation of Doyle Lonnegan, gangster of Swindles It George Roy Hill (1973). Lastly, as it is of habit to let choose the producers for the supporting roles, Richard D. Zanuck proposes for the role of Ellen Brody that which was his wife of 1969 to 1978, the actress Linda Harrison ( the Planet of the monkeys , 747 in danger ). But Spielberg had already chosen Lorraine Gary, the woman of Sidney Sheinberg, general President-director of Music Corporation off America which had at the time Universal Pictures.

Once these established elements, the planning of turning precipitates. Starting from July 8th, 1974, Robert Shaw wanted to turn in Brève meeting ( Brief Encounter ), remake of Brève meeting of David Lean which gained the Grand Prix with the Cannes festival in 1946. In this telefilm of Alan Bridges, the role of Alec Harvey will be finally held by Richard Burton, Robert Shaw being retained on the plate of the Teeth of the sea during sixteen weeks and half.

At all events, the threat of strike action of the Screen Actors Guild leaves little time to the turning whose beginning is fixed at May 2nd, 1974.

Turning

The engineering team takes her districts with Edgartown, town of less: 4000 inhabitants located at Martha's Vineyard. Once on the spot, the scenario once again is polished in the course of the day, then typed the evening with the Typewriter by Carl Gottlieb so that the counterparts are available the morning. John Landis will be even called in urgency on the island to insufflate a little humor to the scenario, but its ambitions of rewriting are too large and its spirit too considered shifted. It sets out again a few hours after being arrived at Martha's Vineyard. The role Roy Scheider takes importance more and more, while the love affair with Matt Hooper with Ellen Brody which was in the novel is gummed. Moreover, Larry Vaughan, the mayor of Amity, does not have any more any bond with the Maffia as it was the case in the book.

Peter Benchley, who sees disappearing from script, a certain number of secondary intrigues contained in his novel, carries himself:

Spielberg would have interest to work the characterization. For all to say, it knows nothing strictly there. There is to only see: it is a type of twenty-six years nourished of cinema. It is not informed any of the real-world apart from films. Its culture is limited to the series B. when it must decide behavior of a character, it takes as a starting point the cinematographic stereotypes of the Forties and Fifties…
Un day, one will greet in him the largest American realizer of second team|Interview of Peter Benchley appeared in the Los Angeles Times Calendar of July 7th, 1974.

Whereas Spielberg, conforms to its practice, does not hesitate to invest over the scenes of action to the detriment of the actors paid with the union rate, it is not the same for the team of technicians. Protected by the local unions from New York and Boston from the I.A.T.S.E. (International Alliance off Theatrical Training course Employed), they are too numerous on the plate. Moreover, one day, Paul F. Connors, delegated I.A.T.S.E. Boston then in shift for its re-election, unloads on the film set and transfers 23 technicians not syndicated by requiring so that they be replaced by union member. The trade-union prolèmes do not stop there since the whole of the engineering team is obliged to take the bus because of a decision of the trade union of the truck-drivers, under penalty of seeing stopping turning. Other factors raise the price of the budget: the film sent and developed in California, the price of the hotel rooms which climb from 14 to 45 dollars the night, the combinations of diving which total 60 dollars moreover than if they came from Los Angeles, a guarantee of: 100000 dollars required by the island for the safeguarding of site etc

But what is expensive, they are especially the whims of the mechanical sharks. Nowadays, the actors turn separately of the special effects, which is not the case on this turning which at June 6th already took 14 days of delay. Robert Shaw being British, it does not wish to pay his taxes in the United States and does not have consequently to cumulate day of turning too much over there. It thus benefits from the “technical pauses” to escape from the Canada or the Bermuda.

The 3 false sharks in Polyurethane, baptized Bruce according to the name of a lawyer of Spielberg, make 1,5 ton, cost: 150000 dollars part and require a team of 13 people to handle them. Their principle of operation is simple: the false sharks are built on a reinforcement in Acier planted at the top of a 4 height meters tower, always out of steel, itself fixed on a underwater Traîneau. By moving the sledge, the technicians give the impression which the shark evolves/moves under water.

But the system is fragile and must constantly be maintained and repaired.

Even if the team is relieved by the withdrawal of the strike of the Screen Actors Guild , the respite is only of short duration since on July 17th, only 96 plans are out of box. The worst is to be come on July 30th. This day, the boat of film, the Orca , is damaged. Two cameras Arriflex are damaged as 300 meters of film which however will be entirely recovered by the laboratories Eastman.

Celebrities of passage on the island come to see the turning which lasts for ever: the journalist of television Walter Cronkite, the actress Ruth Gordon, the novelist Thornton Wilder and the journalist James Reston, known as “Scotty” Reston, the two last having at the time a villa on Martha's Vineyard.

The actors start to have some enough and at the end of July, Sidney Sheinberg convenes Spielberg, the realizer, Zanuck and Brown, the producers, in order to have an explanation on the times of turning and the budget which increase unceasingly. He threatens to put an end to the project if the problems are not quickly regulated.

Learning the difficulties from turning, journalists unload on the island, often accommodated by the actors themselves, be-saying interested by turning, whereas actually they seek to get information about the defective shark. It is thus of L.M. Kit Carson then criticizes with the magazine Oui which is made eject plate or of a journalist of the Christian Science Monitor , which will be the first to take photographs of the shark. This bad experiment will make that Spielberg turns since its films on closed plates to the public and the journalists. Roy Scheider will say on this subject:

It is incredible the number of people who déboulaient at Martha's Vineyard while saying themselves very interested by turning, whereas all that they wanted was to reveal our concern with the mechanical shark. And what made us really badly, they is that we, these people, one accommodated them with open arms, one was with the small care, one granted our confidence to them, and then they betrayed us in the great widths|Matter Roy To cob mentioned in the article of Rex Reed published in the Sunday News of June 15th, 1975.

Turning in outside is definitively completed on December 15th, 1974, after 155 days of catches of sights.

Spielberg is relieved that the film is on the end, because as he entrusted many times, it was one of most difficult turnings of his career.

It joined Verna Fields then to supervise the final assembly, which had already started, the chief monteuse having worked on the rushes, each evening after the catches of sights of the day. He finally explains to John Williams what he wants like music for his film.

Source

John Baxter (translation Mimi and Isabelle Perrin), Citizen Spielberg: biography , New world, 479 pages, Paris, 2004, pages 121-142.

References

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