Friday Film - Jaws (1975)
There are many reasons to watch Jaws. The performances are excellent, the soundtrack is arguably one of the most recognisable in cinema history, and the shark itself remains a deeply unpleasant proposition, despite occasionally looking like something you might encounter at the end of Blackpool Pleasure Beach. In these days of CGI and AI, that mechanical beast and its slightly unnatural movements feels somehow as reassuring as it is scary. But this is Hikerdelic and with that in mind, there's another reason to revisit Steven Spielberg's 1975 masterpiece. The clothes are absolutely brilliant. Not in the carefully considered, stylistically coordinated way that modern cinema sometimes approaches costume design. Quite the opposite. The characters in Jaws look like people who have got dressed for the day without giving much thought to how they might appear in a film that would eventually become one of the most successful of all time. And that's precisely what makes them interesting. Chief Martin Brody, played by Roy Scheider, spends much of the film looking like an ordinary middle-aged man who's been given an increasingly unreasonable set of responsibilities. His clothes are practical, understated and occasionally slightly too warm for the weather. Matt Hooper, Richard Dreyfuss's enthusiastic marine biologist, has a wardrobe that suggests a man who knows his way around an outdoor equipment catalogue. He's younger, wealthier and technically knowledgeable, with the kind of relaxed coastal clothing that would look entirely at home in a contemporary menswear editorial. Then there's Quint. Played magnificently by Robert Shaw, Quint is the sort of man who appears to have been assembled from rope, salt water and several decades of unresolved personal grievances. His clothes are an extension of his character. Worn work shirts, practical layers, battered headwear and heavy-duty garments that have clearly spent more time at sea than most of us would consider reasonable. He looks like a fisherman because he is a fisherman. It's a distinction worth making.Plus Robert Shaw was somewhat inexplicably born in Bolton, which is only a few miles from where we sit here at Hikerdelic. Seriously, look it up. Much of what we now recognise as classic menswear began life as clothing designed for people who had considerably more important things to worry about than looking fashionable. Sailors, fishermen, dockworkers and other maritime trades required garments capable of surviving prolonged exposure to wind, rain, cold and physical labour. The resulting clothing was generally simple, robust and built around function. Heavy woollen sweaters became particularly associated with maritime life, although different regions developed their own traditions. The cable-knit Aran sweater, for example, is closely connected to Ireland's western islands, while the tightly knitted guernsey or gansey has a long history among fishing communities around the British coast. The distinctions between these garments are often blurred in contemporary fashion, where almost anything vaguely nautical tends to be described as a fisherman's jumper. But their histories are worth understanding. A traditional gansey was knitted densely enough to offer useful protection against the elements, with construction details designed around the demands of working life. Patterns varied between communities and makers, and the garments became an important part of the visual identity of Britain's fishing towns. Today, similar designs can be found in expensive boutiques, usually accompanied by descriptions involving words like heritage, authenticity and timelessness. Quint would probably have found this hilarious. What's remarkable about Jaws is how effectively its costumes establish the differences between its three principal characters. Brody represents authority, albeit authority that is increasingly out of its depth. Hooper represents science, education and modern expertise. Quint represents experience, instinct and a form of traditional knowledge acquired through years of doing something rather than reading about it. Their clothing reflects these differences without ever needing to draw attention to itself. It's an unusually convincing portrayal of the relationship between work and dress. The film's setting is equally important. Amity Island is a fictional New England resort community whose economy depends on the arrival of summer visitors. Its beaches, harbour and coastal businesses are presented as an idyllic destination, at least until an unusually determined great white shark begins causing problems for the local tourism industry. The conflict between public safety and commercial interests forms much of the film's tension. Mayor Larry Vaughn's determination to keep the beaches open is often remembered as a particularly spectacular example of political shortsightedness. But it also reflects the economic realities of communities that depend heavily on seasonal tourism. The beach is simultaneously a natural environment, a place of recreation and a commercial asset. For visitors, the sea represents freedom and relaxation. For fishermen, it represents work. For the shark, it represents somewhere to have lunch. These competing relationships with the same environment are central to the film. They're also a useful reminder that our romantic view of coastal life rarely accounts for the realities of those who work there. Fishing remains one of the world's most hazardous occupations. The traditional clothing associated with maritime labour developed in response to conditions that were often cold, exhausting and dangerous. That much of this clothing has subsequently been adopted by people whose closest encounter with the sea involves a weekend in Whitby is one of the more entertaining developments in menswear history. Of course, Jaws is also a film about masculinity. The three men aboard the Orca represent competing ideas about what it means to be capable. Hooper has technology and education. Quint has experience and bravado. Brody has a badge, a gun and an understandable desire to be somewhere else. Their disagreements become increasingly absurd as the shark demonstrates a complete lack of respect for any of these qualifications. It's a dynamic that will be familiar to anyone who's ever watched three men attempt to put up a tent. Nearly half a century after its release, Jaws continues to influence how we imagine the sea, coastal communities and the people who inhabit them. It also happens to contain some of the finest examples of unselfconscious outdoor clothing ever committed to film. There's a lesson in that somewhere. The best clothes aren't always designed to look good. Sometimes they look good because they were designed to do something else. And if you're planning to spend several days aboard a small fishing boat hunting a gigantic shark, we'd strongly recommend taking a decent jumper. Possibly two.
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