Sounds of the innerspaces rushing forward.

Then a splinter of blue light in the center of the picture.

It breaks wide, showing the top and bottom a silhouetted curtain of razor sharp teeth suggesting that we are inside of a tremendous gullet, looking out at the onrushing undersea world at night. HEAR a symphony of underwater sounds: landslide, metabolic sounds, the rare and secret noises that certain undersea species share with each other. Also, the hint of familiar music, twisted and distorted by the depths.

It is a pleasant, moonlit, windless night in mid-June. We see a long straight stretch of white beach. Behind the low dunes are the dark shapes of large expensive houses. Hear a number of voices singing. It sounds like an eastern university’s alma mater, no longer distorted.

Around a blazing bonfire, a group of young men and women, beer cans (or maybe a keg) in evidence, as well as the bota Spanish leather wine-bag much in favor by beach and ski-bum types.

The group is swapping sentimental alma maters, weepily singing eastern Ivy League anthems – Dartmouth, Cornell, Harvard, Penn, etc. Two young people break away from the others. They are Tom Cassidy and Chrissie. Behind them, there is considerable necking activity; Tom and Chrissie are more serious.

Makes a clumsy attempt at snaring Chrissie, cups her from behind. She squirms playfully out of his grasp. We discover he’s not especially sober.

TOM

Tom and Chrissie are separated from the others, silhouetted against the fire, she pauses and looks at the ocean, he is plodding along in the sand, winded.

Chrissie runs down the slope of the dune towards the water, leaving Tom reeling atop the dune. As she runs, she is shedding her clothes. Tom is trying to trail her by her clothes, like Hansel following bread crumbs through the woods.

But Chrissie is way ahead of him.

CHRISSIE

She runs headlong into the inviting sea, plunges cleanly into the water with a light “Whoops!” as the cold water sweeps over her.

Behind all this, we continue to hear the sentimental, beery chorus of alma maters.

Then we see it – a gentle bulge in the water, a ripple that passes her a dozen feet away. A pressure wave lifts her up, then eases her down again, like a smooth, sudden swell.

CHRISSIE

She looks around for him, finds him still on the beach, his feet tangled in his pants, which have dropped around his ankles. She starts to swim back in to him.

Her expression freezes. The water-bulge is racing towards her. The first bump jolts her upright, out of the water to her hips. She reaches under water to touch her leg. Whatever she feels makes her open her mouth to scream, but she is slammed again, hard, whipped into an arc of about eight feet, up and down, submerging her down to her open mouth, choking off any scream she might try to make. Another jolt to her body, driving her under so that only her hair swirls on the surface. Then it too is sucked below in a final and terrible jerking motion. HOLD on the eddies and swirls until we’re sure it’s all over.

In his shorts, laughing to himself, turning in slow stoned circles, held prisoner by his windbreaker which seems to have him in an armlock, as he struggles to free his arm from a tight sleeve. As he turns, we hear the alma maters in the background, from the fire.

A shaft of morning sun blasts through the crack between the bottom of the shade and the windowsill, falling across the heads of the sleeping couple on the bed. It catches Martin Brody right across the eyes, bringing him up from sleep. The job is completed by the clock radio, which clicks on with local fisherman’s report and weather.

RADIO ANNOUNCER V.O.

Ellen Brody burrows her head under the covers, avoiding morning for a few precious minutes more.

BRODY

ELLEN

We hear the scampering toenails of two cocker spaniels scrabbling around the foot of the bed. Brody swings out of bed, wearing shorts, socks, and tee shirt.

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

He leads the dogs out of the bedroom and down to the kitchen.

Brody enters, sets down some dog food, goes to make coffee, starts to fill kettle to boil water, the cold water rushes through and out the burnt-out bottom of the kettle.

BRODY

ELLEN O.S.

BRODY

Ellen Brody, a tall, attractive blonde woman, enters from upstairs. She’s still slightly sleepy, not what you’d call an “Instant-On” person. Mornings are not her best time.

ELLEN

BRODY

ELLEN

Before Brody can answer, Michael, his oldest boy, enters, holding his hand. There is bright new blood on it, but he is sensibly unconcerned. It’s a normal childhood scrape.

MICHAEL

BRODY

ELLEN

Michael goes on out and upstairs. Ellen fumbles in her pocket and produces Brody’s new glasses, which she holds out to him.

ELLEN

BRODY

ELLEN

Brody reacts to this, and bends to kiss her lightly. Then more seriously.

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

He looks out the window to the view beyond, discovering some new wonder in the fresh sunlit morning.

Sean, the younger child, is happily romping in the summer air, enjoying the very air he breathes.

BRODY

The phone rings.

Brody answers one of two phones on the wall.

BRODY

Michael reenters in bathing trunks, with a towel on his shoulder, his hand washed, holding a band-aid ready for application. Ellen takes it, and bandages the finger with care and affection.

ELLEN

Michael heads toward the beach.

BRODY

He gets his shirt on with Ellen’s help. She flicks imaginary dust from the badge on his chest.

ELLEN

BRODY

He gives her a light kiss, starts to go, with his cup.

BRODY

ELLEN

At the door, he takes a windbreaker off a peg and goes on out.

We can see the Amity Police shoulder patch as he goes to a van parked outside.

Martin Brody’s Country Squire police wagon rushes past, taking the view to an enormous billboard depicting a typical summer day in Amity. A beautiful model splashes in the gold surf, languishing in a Solarcaine sun. AMITY WELCOMES YOU is written above her flailing arms.

Three small figures in the landscape, walking the beach. The surf is rough and there is sea-floor debris strewn about from the receding tide.

Deputy Hendricks is searching the shore about one hundred yards down wind. Meanwhile, Brody, in his casual police attire, and Tom Cassidy, still in the clothing we saw him in last night, walk down the beach. Brody fingers the missing girl’s shoes, purse and clothes. In the daylight, Cassidy misconducts himself, wavering between inflated maturity and tear-blown adolescence.

BRODY

CASSIDY

BRODY

CASSIDY

BRODY

CASSIDY

BRODY

CASSIDY

BRODY

CASSIDY

BRODY

CASSIDY

BRODY

CASSIDY

BRODY

A shrill whistle makes them turn. Hendricks is fifty yards away, on his knees. He blows again, a feeble report this time.

BRODY

Brody runs toward Hendricks, Cassidy hesitates, then follows with:

CASSIDY

A skein of seaweed garnishes the base of this isolated dune.

The booming waves and fizzing surf make dialogue inaudible.

Deputy Hendricks on hands and knees, looking white as a sheet. Brody tells Cassidy to wait at the foot of the dune, and ventures up. Hendricks stops him with a wave-off, saying something at the same time. Brody nods understanding and steps up cautiously and looks down. He adjusts his glasses, trying to make sense of what he is looking at.

Whatever he sees has a marked effect on his entire physique.

Kicking out with his foot, Brody sends dozens of angry horseshoe crabs into an escape frenzy and they boil over the top of the dune and down its slopes.

Cassidy takes a few uneasy steps backwards when Brody waves him over. He shakes his head. An awkward moment. Then Cassidy shuffles forward and up the few remaining feet, his eyes looking everywhere but down. Brody says something else and Cassidy shakes his head again, eyes out at sea. Brody puts his hand gently around the quaking man’s shoulder.

Nodding, he starts to look down, an inch at a time. He looks.

He, too, can’t make out what it is at first. Then he understands.

The jolt that assaults Cassidy is not unexpected. He falls backward in a sitting position as though shot. Nods yes – it’s her. Brody turns and slides off the dune, stumbling close. Hear his breathing. He looks around, envisioning the week ahead of him....

Chrissie’s remains, incomplete from the chest down, horribly bitten. (NOTE: See Hooper’s dialog in Sc. 91 for complete description of corpse.)

Brody walks through the door and enters his office, holding a fizzing glass of Alka-Seltzer. Polly, his sixty-one year old secretary follows close on his heels with her shorthand pad of messages and reminders.

In the outer office, Hendricks and Cassidy slump into chairs, sipping from fizzing dixie cups.

Brody dips into file drawers for the appropriate forms. He gently turns on Polly, who is behind him.

BRODY

Brody slips behind his typewriter, putting paper in the machine with the effortless ease of years of practice. He’s obviously no stranger to paperwork. He touch types, hardly ever looking down, checking his notes and listening with one ear to Polly.

He is affected by what he’s seen, but there’s work to be done.

POLLY

Brody has just typed the girl’s name. He skips the space for Cause-of-Death, and just under it types the Next-of-Kin information he has collected from her wallet.

POLLY

The phone rings and Polly picks it up.

POLLY

Brody nestles the phone between ear and collar, listening, as he turns to the typewriter.

BRODY

Cause-of-Death line rolls into place. The hammers punch out: SHARK ATTACK.

BRODY

leans forward, staring at what he just wrote. Polly cocks her head and removes the phone from his ear.

POLLY

Brody takes a breath. A new resolve comes over him.

BRODY

POLLY

Brody gets up and moves hastily toward the door.

Cassidy and Hendricks look up as Brody enters.

BRODY

HENDRICKS

A local merchant comes through the door.

LOCAL MERCHANT

Brody pushes past him and out the door.

In the busy center of a town preparing for the big Fourth of July weekend, Brody wends his way around sidewalk activity, purpose and haste in each stride. As he turns a corner a little man in a white smock emerges from the Funeral Parlor.

This is Carl Santos, Amity’s part-time coroner. Santos looks both ways before crossing Colonial Drive.

Brody passes Keisel’s Bicycle Rental, navigating an awkward course through an odd assortment of Schwinns that line the sidewalk in front of a demolished white picket fence. Keisel intercepts Brody on the run.

KEISEL

Brody nods yes, and starts to move away, but Keisel holds on to him.

KEISEL

He holds up bicycle. The bicycle’s spokes are bent and broken from some sort of blows.

KEISEL

BRODY

Santos emerges with Ben Meadows, the stylish, late-thirties editor of the Amity Gazette. Together they cut a beeline for the other side of the street.

Past taverns and chowder shacks, past bleacher construction and July Fourth posters, Brody enters Hardware and Sporting Goods... so overstocked that beach umbrellas, aluminum deck chairs, and rainbow beach towels splash a surplus of color from the display window to the sidewalk.

The store proprietor is busy at work on an inventory list with a mainland delivery man.

LYNWOOD

Brody emerges with enough poster-board, wooden stakes, nails, paint, and brushes to close every beach on the island. He starts back the way he came when Hendricks shoots up the street in the patrol jeep. He stops fast enough to call attention, leans out the window.

HENDRICKS

BRODY

HENDRICKS

Revealing Larry Vaughn, the Mayor of Amity, exchanging anxieties with Ben Meadows and Coroner Santos and two other city Selectmen. They come out in a group, reach the sunlight, and squint down the street as Brody careens around the corner and out of sight. Deputy Hendricks, laden with his arts and crafts, passes them on the street front.

VAUGHN

HENDRICKS

Vaughn and group exchange horrified looks, but we get the impression it is not in response to the shark-attack news.

VAUGHN

HENDRICKS

VAUGHN

HENDRICKS

VAUGHN

They all crowd into a Cadillac El Dorado with Vaughn Realty signs on the doors.

A flotilla of twenty exhausted Boy Scouts round a buoy that marks the official course. A rowboat with Scoutmaster using a bullhorn keeps pace, and urges the boys on.

SCOUTMASTER

Two older Seascouts look on with stop watches and clipboards, while some Parents shade their eyes from the sun, watching their offspring. Brody pulls up in the Amity Police jeep, and starts toward the people. Behind him, Vaughn’s Cadillac pulls up and skids to a stop. In it are Vaughn, Meadows, the Doctor, maybe a Selectman, and Hendricks, with his arms still full of sign material. Vaughn intercepts Brody, the others circle around him, effectively slowing his progress through the sand to the scouts.

VAUGHN

BRODY

MEADOWS

VAUGHN

BRODY

VAUGHN

BRODY

MEADOWS

BRODY

VAUGHN

DOCTOR

VAUGHN

MEADOWS

The men all laugh, ad lib their remembrances of this foolishness.

MEADOWS

BRODY

DOCTOR

MEADOWS

VAUGHN

BRODY

Brody looks out to the water where the scouts are rounding another buoy on the home stretch.

VAUGHN

Vaughn indicates the beach where the Scouts are flopping out onto the sand, exhausted, glad to be finished.

BRODY

VAUGHN

All ad lib agreement.

VAUGHN

MEADOWS

VAUGHN

The others surround Brody as Vaughn leads the way back to the cars, ad libbing their problem with the little karate choppers.

Hendricks puts the signs back into the trunk of Vaughn’s Cadillac. Vaughn waves casually to the Scouts and swimmers who are vigorously toweling off in the background.

In front of Amity’s only Music Store, a battered old pick-up truck pulls in to the curb. Quint and his mate cross silently heading into the music store.

A gently tinkling bell tolls Quint’s entrance. Inside the store, a ten-year-old boy is being shown a clarinet. He is playing a mellow low tone, and running “Ode to Joy.” Quint looms past him like Neptune rising from the deep, and lets his hand drop on the counter with a slap that sounds like a club on flesh. The Shopkeeper abandons the little boy and meets Quint.

SHOPKEEPER

QUINT

SHOPKEEPER

QUINT

Without waiting for it to be wrapped, he picks up the gleaming wire in his gnarled fist, and drops a bill on the counter.

SHOPKEEPER

No answer from Quint, who stops and sings along with the boy.

The little kid’s music degenerates into a series of awkward squeaks and blurps, as Quint stares at him. Quint continues out the door, threading his way through the people in the street like some great fish. As he gets up into the cab of his pick-up, its door swings open so we can see a crude stylized shark decorating its side. It slams behind him as Quint gets in and drives away.

A plump jelly-bowl of a woman plunges into the ocean. There’s enough there to satisfy the most gluttonous shark. Buoyant, joyful, she splashes away in abandon. From her, we pan off to reveal other cheerful bathers enjoying that last uncluttered weekend before the season starts in earnest.

A Man and his dog are romping at the water’s edge. The Man is throwing a stick out into the surf, the dog, a happy retriever, is bounding into the waves after it.

A Girl and her Boyfriend leave their blanket and run for the water, playing tag, chasing each other, having a wonderful time.

He is sitting stiffly in a beach chair, scanning the beach with careful, cautious looks, eyeballing everything that’s going on.

Around their particular blanket and umbrella are a number of adults and their kids, the youngsters gathered to celebrate Michael’s birthday. Ellen is dishing out ice cream and cake from a cooler chest to the raucous 10-year-olds. Michael’s hand is still bandaged.

MAX TAFT

MRS. TAFT

Brody (and we) hear a shrill scream from the water. He stretches to look past the group, to see what’s happening out there.

The young lady is disappearing under the water, pulled under the waves by some force. She is shrieking. She pops right up again riding the shoulders of her boyfriend, who pulled her under. She’s laughing hysterically. Brody is unamused.

BRODY

TAFT

Ellen captures Sean, and holds him playfully, an example.

ELLEN

TAFT

SEAN

Brody rumples his hair and sets him off to play.

It’s Alex Kintner, and his mother, nearby, reading a novel.

Alex is towing a funny rubber raft, and headed for the water.

MRS. KINTNER

ALEX

MRS. KINTNER

He holds out his hands.

MRS. KINTNER

Alex starts for the ocean. Behind him, Michael and his gang are also heading for the inviting waves. Brody is watching them go, his spine rigid with tension.

As Alex and the boys hit the water, we see the man throwing his stick into the waves, his dog swimming strongly after it.

Out beyond the kids and the dog, the Fat Lady is bobbing around, out way too far, isolated from the other swimmers.

A fish’s-eye view of the bathers: lots of little kicking legs, rafts with tasty arms dangling in the blue, slowing circling, favoring one raft (little Alex’s). The Kintner boy’s legs and arms are kicking and paddling, producing bizarre underwater vibrations of more than passing interest. Dog goes by, dog-paddling along.

Brody is half-rising, looking out over the water. The Fat Lady is not where he remembered her. He scans the water anxiously.

ELLEN

A Black Object swims across the water. It’s the dog, breasting against the surf.

It’s the Fat Lady, floating, relaxing. A black object swims up to her. It’s not the dog. It rears up out of the water.

It’s a man in a black bathing cap. They exchange distant pleasantries, he strokes away.

Alex Kintner, paddling around, making boat sounds, tooting, going “vroom, vroom.”

They kiss, embrace, kiss again. Strong stuff. They sink beneath the waves, knotted in an embrace.

He’s trying to salvage a soggy piece of birthday cake, holding it above the water, paddling with his other hand. The bandage has come part way loose, and his cut is trailing in the water.

Ellen is rubbing suntan oil on his back, and he is allowing himself to relax part way. His eyes still nervously scan the beach in a constant surveillance. Mr. Keisel is coming out of the water, toweling off vigorously, exclaiming to himself.

BRODY

KEISEL

ELLEN

BRODY

Michael has just been drenched. He splashes back. A big waterfight ensues, the boys splashing and chopping at the water, shouting battle cries and karate whoops. Alex is paddling around near them, but not involved with them.

The Man with the Dog is whistling into the ocean, looking for his dog.

DOG MAN

A huge splash explodes in the water near the gang, an eruption of foam and spray that stops everyone cold for a moment. They stop to see who was responsible.

A KID MATHEW

Before anyone can answer, another kid (P.J.) renews the battle, whooping a karate cry, and slashing at the water with his hand like a little kung-fu warrior, advancing through the waves.

He hits the water, which sprays up suspiciously pink. He stares at it, surprised.

His hands are dripping deep pink, the red matting his hair, running into his eyes. He looks down. The boys are surrounded with a deep pink slick, their little bodies ringed by a spreading stain of blood.

He’s pointing frantically out to sea.

TOURIST

WOMAN

He leaps to his feet, nearly knocking Ellen over, and starts for the water.

ELLEN

Brody is pelting towards the water. He kicks sand over an annoyed Mrs. Kintner, who looks up, just in time to hear Brody’s bellow.

BRODY

His urgency communicates itself to the others. Ellen snatches Sean up from where he’s been playing in the sand. Other parents are calling their kids, hysteria mounting. People rush into the water, dragging their children and families bodily out of the ocean. The first kids coming out of the surf are frantically trying to wash the sticky blood off their bodies. The sight of the red sends the beach into a full panic.

He rushes into the water, up to his ankles, and suddenly stops, unable to move into deeper water. He is urging Michael out, holding his hands out to his son, who is slogging through the surf towards his dad. He stands there immobilized by the water, nervously helping people out of it onto the beach.

As he emerges from the water, Alex Kintner’s raft washes in behind him, ripped in half, the water pink, the foam spreading the stain onto the sand as the wave breaks.

Her voice rising into panic and hysteria with each unanswered cry.

MRS. KINTNER

We are looking at the closed double white front doors of the building, through which we can hear a rolling boil of agitated conversation. After a beat, they open to reveal Mrs. Kintner, looking as though she has been visited by the wrath of God; in effect, she has. Her eyes are puffy and swollen from weeping, her clothing is put on and fastened awkwardly, her gait is not normal. As she walks toward us, Quint enters with his back to us, they pass without notice; Mrs. Kintner moving out of sight, Quint leading us through the doors into the town hall.

A crowd of angry men and women throng the central hallway, their voices a babble of confusion. Many of them are gathered around a roughly lettered notice that has been posted on the town’s official bulletin board. It reads.

“A $3000 BOUNTY TO THE MAN OR MEN WHO CATCH AND KILL THE SHARK THAT KILLED ALEX M. KINTNER ON SUNDAY, JUNE 29, ON THE AMITY TOWN BEACH.”

Vaughn and Brody are on the outskirts of the crowd, which includes Meadows, some selectmen, and others.

BRODY

MEADOWS

BRODY

VAUGHN

There is a flurry and a bustle as everyone rearranges themselves and makes their way into the Amity Selectmen’s Council Chambers.

The crowd is thronging into the large room. Already in the room is a solitary figure, standing all the way in the rear, watching everyone as they enter. Against the back wall is a large blackboard used for town business during meetings.

VAUGHN

DENHERDER

VAUGHN

BRODY

MEADOWS

All react.

BRODY

VAUGHN

WOMAN

BRODY

Pandemonium. A collective nerve has been touched.

VAUGHN

BRODY

MRS. TAFT

MR. KEISEL

Two opinions have been expressed, and the crowd takes sides vociferously, ad libbing assent or dissent depending on the point of view held forth.

MR. WISEMAN

MR. HASSETT

MRS. TAFT

MR. POSNER

MR. POLK

He has just run his large, coarse fingernails over the blackboard. He is a large, rough man, a professional fisherman marked by daily physical toil, About 45 or 50, it’s hard to tell where the scars leave off and the wrinkles begin. There is a bit of the showman in him, as well as a bit of killer-whale.

QUINT

Crowd reaction.

QUINT

VAUGHN

A riffly blur, color alternating with black and white. The dizziness stops on a book page showing a black and white rendering of eight species of shark. The banner at the top of the page reads: THE KNOWN AND REPUTED MANEATERS.

The riffling begins again, stops on a grizzly photograph of scar tissue on six former shark victims. Riffling – stop.

Photograph of five Ichthyologists posing on wooden stools, framed by the enormous jaws of a prehistoric shark from the family Carcharodon charcharias.

BRODY

his reading glasses reflecting a stack of twelve library books, all on the subject of sharks and shark attacks. The door opens and Ellen enters, quietly, in respect for Brody’s mood.

ELLEN

BRODY

Ellen walks past Brody to the window and looks out the window which overlooks the south bay. It is the hour of dusk.

ELLEN

BRODY

ELLEN

Brody gets up, concerned, and joins her at the window.

ELLEN

Michael is sitting in the boat, but two of his young school chums are in the water, swimming around it. Brody opens the window and calls down:

BRODY

MICHAEL

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

Ellen’s eyes drift down to the open book, which is displaying a reproduction of the famous painting “The Gulf Stream,” showing a black fisherman in a small dinghy similar to Michael’s being assaulted by the jaws of three man-eating sharks, circling his boat.

ELLEN

Hendricks and another deputy are assisting Brody. Silhouettes of townspeople look on like mourners at a funeral.

In the background some workmen are taking down the shutters from a quaint summer cottage. They pause to watch the declining moments of the day.

Three Selectmen also stand watching. One of them seems to be whispering bounty news to three youngish men on a nearby dune.

Sounds: Surf and hammering.

Selectman Denherder and his buddy, Charlie, a professional angler, row towards a tumble-down jetty that leads fifty feet out into the black water.

DENHERDER

CHARLIE

DENHERDER

Denherder hefts a bloodstained laundry bag from the wheelbarrow, revealing about a hundred feet of coiled dog chain and a large patched inner tube. Charlie takes out a monster hook and together they push the wheelbarrow onto the rickety pier that is only about five feet across.

DENHERDER

CHARLIE

DENHERDER

The splintered pier sways to and fro as the men reach the end and start to work. Charlie baits the hook with a massive chunk of sirloin while Denherder secures the loose end of chain to a skinny piling. Charlie then fastens the inner tube to the chain five feet from the end of the hook.

DENHERDER

CHARLIE

Denherder tugs the chain against the piling to prove that it is. Charlie heaves the bait. Splash! The inner tube follows and both men eagerly watch as it floats seaward, the chain playing out from the wheelbarrow.

CHARLIE

Charlie lights his pipe and sits back against a piling. He turns on his transistor radio and loops one end around a fractured board. Denherder paces, bored to death.

DENHERDER

CHARLIE

DENHERDER

Suddenly zipping out, faster and faster, as both men straighten.

Denherder is goggle-eyed.

DENHERDER

The chain is coming out so fast that it begins to drag the wheelbarrow to the end of the jetty. A section of chain tangles around the handle and flips the entire machine into the air. Both men watch dumbfounded as the inner tube, racing out to sea in a wake of white water, suddenly dips under.

CHARLIE

DENHERDER

CHARLIE

It is then that the chain whips taut against the narrow pilings.

A lineup of five decrepit 2 x 4 inch pilings SNAP with a resounding CRACK.

The end of the jetty is yanked loose. Denherder is flipped like a chip over the side and into the cold night water, where he manages to snag hold of a splintered timber.

The severed section of jetty, a joined platform of footboards, is being dragged seaward with Charlie sitting dazed on top of it, his lit pipe still going.

DENHERDER

Charlie rolls into the water, sputters, turns to watch the flotilla of wood draw away.

looking seaward.

The end of the jetty makes a 180-degree turn and heads back in his direction.

CHARLIE

Denherder steps up on the broken-off piling just to be out of the water.

DENHERDER

Charlie, inhaling terror, trying to slog to shore. The jetty is getting closer. Suddenly, an enormous black fin breaks water like a periscope, making course corrections as it comes for Charlie.

Denherder jumps from piling to piling, almost losing his balance on his way to help Charlie. Charlie has reached the last pylon toward open sea, and his hands clamber for a hold. But –

The algae is too slippery, and his fingers keep sliding back.

That’s when the fin behind him seems to reach up to the sky and Charlie manages, with Denherder’s desperate help, to make it safely to shore. The remains of the pier float belly-up in the inlet.

He is sitting on a little canvas folding chair, eating a bowl of Cheerios with milk and sugar, watching a panorama of ineptitude and greed unfold before his old seaman’s eyes.

The Amity Pier area is a minor madhouse: out-of-state cars elbow local vehicles for parking space at the foot of the dock, and a parade of bounty-hunting townspeople, islanders, off-islanders, tourist, and others shout and push their way onto the crowded pier, each carrying some bizarre or appropriate tool for the real or imagined capture of an unarmed shark of indeterminate size.

Rods and reels, drop lines, crossbows, slingshots, harpoons, shotguns, rifles, nets and tridents; every fishing supply store and sporting goods house within a hundred miles has been cannibalized to equip this weird array.

Not having room to bring their police vehicle anywhere near this mess, they are proceeding on foot into the confusion.

HENDRICKS

BRODY

Some of the locals greet Hendricks with occasional nods of recognition, or an ad libbed “Hi, Lenny,” or “Hey, Lenny.”

HENDRICKS

BRODY

An argument is in progress between and Out-of-Towner and the Boat Rental Man.

OUT-OF-TOWNER

BOAT RENTAL MAN

Making its way through the channel towards the dock is a sleek, expensive runabout with the name “Fascinatin’ Rhythm” on the stern. It’s professionally handled, and rumbles in as it coasts in towards the dock area. Some other boats clear the way for it, zig-zagging in the harbor, causing an annoying chop.

Matt Hooper, a bearded, bespectacled young man with an intent look, is maneuvering the vessel peering through his windscreen at the ragtag collection of seafaring loonies all around him.

Hendricks is mediating the argument between the two men, and we can hear a plaintive “But Lenny,” from the local as Brody sees something that makes him move towards the other side of the dock. We see him cross to a little boat built for two or three that is settling low in the water as a seventh man climbs in with his gear.

BRODY

MAN IN BOAT WALTER

BRODY

Matt Hooper is gliding into the dockside, and Ben throws him a line to help make fast as he moors. It’s a small island of courtesy in an otherwise discourteous mob. Hooper nods politely as he ties his boat up and steps onto the dock.

HOOPER

GARDNER

He’s standing near where Brody is finishing after his encounter with the chummers.

Brody approaches Ben Gardner.

BRODY

GARDNER

The Mate nods “Yes” and starts to prepare to get under way.

Ben and his Mate move away from the dock, headed towards the channel and the open sea leaving Felix and Pratt to scamper around the dock looking for another ride.

A particularly awkward moment between a small sailboat and a couple of powerboats. The sailboat is trying to hoist sail to make it away from the pier under sail, a real yachtsman’s conceit, since Hornblower himself probably couldn’t navigate through this mess. Brody, a landlubber for sure, is trying to direct traffic to untangle this new mess.

BRODY

Amidst all this, we can hear the angry shouts of the entangled crews.

SKIPPER 1 THE SAILBOAT

SKIPPER 2 MOTORBOAT

HOOPER

SAILBOAT SKIPPER

MOTORBOAT SKIPPER

HOOPER

BRODY

Brody starts back towards the shore, Hooper is by his side.

HOOPER

Before he can finish, Brody spots something on shore that moves him to shout to his deputy.

HOOPER

Brody looks, and stops by a boat that’s about to cast off.

He holds out his hand.

BRODY

MAN

BRODY

The man passes Brody a cigar box filled with dynamite sticks.

Brody tucks the dynamite under his arm, and continues down the pier. Hooper is still with him.

All around them are two distinctly different breeds; the quiet pros, like Ben Gardner, in well-worn, comfortable clothes, with efficient, sensible gear, and the amateur crazies, with all manner of weapons and impractical, silly tourist clothing.

Brody is on the phone, talking to his office, trying to get Hendricks’ attention. He throws a handful of washers at the window.

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

Ben Gardner’s boat is in the lead with Gardner’s shouting derisive comments at the crowd headed out from land. The armada is spread out and moving in a ragged circle, fifteen boats in all. One man heaves cherry bombs into the water. A smaller boat going in the opposite direction offers us Barwood, forking spaghetti leftovers into the ocean while his friend pours out a bottle of ketchup.

A speedboat chugs by, one of the occupants reading instructions aloud from a book entitled “Sharks - East Coast, Vol. I.”

boatload of impoverished scallop fishermen throw a net overboard, full of gaps and split ends. The professionals look professional, but the landlubbers out for the $3000 make it impossible for everybody. Collisions are barely averted.

The Out-of-Towner in a small boat is bent over in a life and death struggle, his rod in a tight arc. His buddy leaps across to lend a hand.

Twenty yards away in another boat the same struggle ensues.

This time it’s the overloaded boat with the poor scallop fishermen. Shouts of I’M ON! DIG IN! STRIKE! Then a tangle of tackle springs from the water. They have hooked each other.

Joy turns to swearing. Arnold Felix stands up to applaud the mishap, while his buddy Pratt takes careful aim with his Remington 1100 12-gauge and blasts at the tackle as if it were a clay pigeon. The tangle explodes –

Both the Out-of-Towners and the Scallop Fisherman falls over backward –

Three men are aboard, one holding a rod which holds a fast arc. A few yards off stern we see a triangular dorsal fin crossing back and forth, struggling, jerking, the mighty tail threshing. One man is screaming success, the other two slapping the angler on the back.

They spot it and sour.

PRATT

The owner of Pratt’s boat throws it forward and Pratt removes a .45 automatic from the holster of his belt. He tests it, firing once in the air. As they near the scene of the struggle, eleven other boats begin converging, until –

Everyone wants to get into the act. They are attacking the threshing beast with all they’ve got. Pratt uses his automatic, another blasts point blank with a shotgun. There are occasional water ricochets and the bounty hunters duck from time to time as bullets skip by. Finally, the shark stops threshing.

Their boat has moved close to the shark, closer than Harry’s.

PRATT

One of his party in the over-filled boat grabs a gaff and leans out to grab the moribund shark. But Harry won’t give up the line, still reeling in.

HARRY

PRATT

MAN WITH GAFF

Pratt nods reluctantly. The man swings, lodges the gaff and hauls the shark up onto the gunwale. A paroxysm of cheers from the surrounding boats. Smoke flares are fired into the air.

HARRY

It is a ten-foot tiger, and what a mess – splattered with bullet punctures, gashes, bleeding from several orifices. But it is not dead – it kicks back to life and threatens to capsize the boat. Pratt panics and fires six times with his .45. The bullets pierce the shark’s head, pass through, and split the fiberglass hull through which a flood of water rises. Everybody stands up as the boat slips beneath them.

The Amity Morgue is also the Amity Funeral Home, a Victorian house that normally serves as the community’s mortuary. The Coroner, a professional small-town GP, is standing by as Hooper is speaking into a sophisticated cassette recorder with a headpiece that leaves his hands free for measurement with a calibrator or calipers.

BRODY

With a shrug, the Coroner slides open the drawer.

He is looking down as the drawer slides past him, still matter-of-fact, turning on his recorder.

HOOPER

The sheet has just been lifted, and Hooper stares down at the lump on the slab. He stops, turns off his recorder as emotions wage war with his senses. Rationality wins, and he turns on the recorder again.

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

We open close on ugly, open shark’s jaws, still oozing blood and gore. As the shark is hoisted up into the air on a gin-pole hoist dockside, Meadows is seen passing with his secretary and a photographer from the Amity Gazette. A crowd of returning fishermen from the Armada and townspeople are gathering around the fish as it is hoisted tail-up into the classic sports fisherman’s trophy shot.

MEADOWS

As he and the photographer turn to mob, we see Hooper and Brody arriving from the morgue. Hooper immediately heads towards the shark, while Brody pauses and we see a look of relief and delight cross his features.

HOOPER

BRODY

Men ad lib “No, I caught it...” “I hooked him,” etc.

MEADOWS

He continues to call directions and move people out of the way to set up his shot. Hooper is measuring the shark.

MEADOWS

HOOPER

The men (Felix, Pratt, et al) get Brody to join them in the shot. The whole town and the Armada fishermen all line up in a classic “high school” graduating class shot with the victorious fishermen kneeling in front, and the rest of the Armada and Townspeople arranged behind them. Hendricks hold up the “Beach Closed” sign in ironic victory.

Brody spots the Mayor coming towards the dock, and detaches himself from the group to join him.

BRODY

VAUGHN

BRODY

The men who landed the monster are in a tight cluster, debating something with Hooper, who is dwarfed by the big beer bellies and ham-fisted hands all around him. It’s probable we don’t even see him.

The Men ad lib “What kind of shark is this?” “It’s a shark like in the movies they got sharks.” “It’s a man-eater, for sure.” “I bet it’s a record-breaker,” etc.

HOOPER O.S.

Hooper enters the circle, and picks up where he left off, measuring the shark’s teeth. Others watch him. Charlie and Denherder walk over to the shark. Charlie punches it.

They are walking down to the shark together.

VAUGHN

BRODY

VAUGHN

Brody and Vaughn are by now near the circle of fishermen, who are surrounding Hooper, raising their voices at him.

PRATT

GAFFER

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

VAUGHN

HOOPER

BRODY

VAUGHN

MEADOWS

HOOPER

Felix, Pratt and the others ad lib disagreement. “You’re not gonna cut up my trophy,” etc.

VAUGHN

We see Mrs. Kintner approaching, dressed in black.

VAUGHN

She seeks out Brody, and stops in front of him.

MRS. KINTNER

He nods, she slaps him full across the face. There is an embarrassed silence. Some people leave, following a trend that began with the first mention of cutting open the shark.

MRS. KINTNER

She stops, unable to continue. Her father takes her arm and leads her away. Pratt, Harry and the others trail off after her. During the rest of the scene, the camera tightens in on Brody to the exclusion of the others.

VAUGHN

HOOPER

Before Hooper can finish, Brody’s shoulders slump and he goes slack.

BRODY

VAUGHN

BRODY

He turns and leaves abruptly, surrendering the dock to Vaughn and Hooper, who eye each other with mutual dis-admiration.

Brody and Ellen, Sean and Michael, have all finished dinner.

Brody’s plate is untouched, a virgin meatloaf. His glass, on the other hand, is well used, with the remnants of a stiff scotch and ice. He is staring across the table at the youngest, Sean, who makes a face at him. He makes a face back.

They play this game together for a few minutes.

BRODY

SEAN

BRODY

Sean gives Daddy the kiss. Brody shoos him and Michael off to bed. Ellen, who is feeling progressively more left out with each passing moment, gets up abruptly and clears a few dishes. Brody is not letting her into his world for the moment, and it shows. There’s a knock at the door.

HOOPER O.S.

Ellen opens the door for him.

HOOPER

ELLEN

Hooper enters. He’s carrying a couple of bottles of wine which he picked up in town. He sits down near Brody.

ELLEN

HOOPER

He starts in on it, as soon as someone has indicated “go ahead.”

HOOPER

BRODY

They exchange a long look that evolves into a slightly desperate, but shared laughter.

HOOPER

They laugh some more. Ellen is again left out of it.

HOOPER

Brody begins stripping the foil off the wine, screwing in a corkscrew, etc.

ELLEN

HOOPER

ELLEN

HOOPER

BRODY

ELLEN

HOOPER

Brody has the cork out of the wine. Pop.

HOOPER

Brody takes the fine wine, and pours it into his drink glass filling the tumbler to the top with ice cubes, diluted scotch, and the wine.

HOOPER

BRODY

He extends the bottle to Hooper, who politely accepts a token sip. He takes some for himself, and offers some to Ellen.

BRODY

ELLEN

HOOPER

ELLEN

HOOPER

ELLEN

HOOPER

ELLEN

HOOPER

ELLEN

HOOPER

ELLEN

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

Brody digests all this; confirmation of facts he has gleaned in his newly acquired knowledge of the shark species.

There is a long pause.

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

HOOPER

He gets up and they both start out. Ellen watches them go.

Dark, spooky shed, with shadows of boats and strange silhouettes of boat parts and scaffolding. At one end, the large, symmetrical bulk of the shark’s carcass lies on a tarp. A single dark figure is bending over the dead shark.

The large double doors at one end of the shed squeak open, and the Shadowy Figure moves abruptly away from the shark.

The new entrants move into the shed. It is Hooper and Brody and they are continuing the conversation begun in the car on the way over.

As the Shadowy Figure moves silently into a vantage point against one wall, he passes through the light from a window; it is Quint, and we only see him long enough to recognize him as he backs against the wall.

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

They bend over the shape like 18th century graverobbers.

HOOPER

We hear a slurp and a squish as Hooper produces a big knife and dips into the shark with a major incision.

HOOPER

From his vantage point, Quint watches, unseen by the two men.

Brody is holding the light, fighting the gag reflex, fascinated by the bizarre ritual.

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

He kicks the remains around below camera.

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

We see Brody, looking sick and nervous, holding on anxiously as the “Fascinatin’ Rhythm” moves slowly ahead trolling at night. His glasses are already flecked with the white salt of dried seawater. He is wearing a life-preserver.

Hooper is at the wheel, a chart spread in front of him, his eyes scanning the sea restlessly, checking the dials and gauges in front of him as well as the electronic depth-finding and “fish-finder” gear mounted in the cockpit. A green glow shines from the instruments on his face. Two closed-circuit TV cameras mounted below the hull flash their pictures onto monitors in the dash.

In the aisle between the seats is a large container filled with unpleasant-looking bait; Hooper is long-lining for signs of shark, and chumming.

HOOPER

Brody, bored, tired, and slightly queasy, is trying to concentrate on anything but the motion of the boat. He stares at the sophisticated electronics displays.

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

It’s blipping and peeping.

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

The two men looking very small and vulnerable in the open sea, the low-hanging mist obscuring their visibility in the night.

He hears something, his eyes widen. It is the “bump-thump” of something scraping the hull.

BRODY

Hooper looks up and cuts the wheel hard, as the same time dropping the engines into neutral, and then reverse. The sudden change throws Brody to his knees.

BRODY

It’s what they’ve just run into – flooded to the gunwales, loose debris floating around, a tangle of lines and gear looking like floating garbage in the cockpit. Hooper’s light sweeps across it.

BRODY

Hooper cuts his engines and drifts in; he scampers out to the bow of his boat and makes a line fast to the Flicka.

The electronic display is showing increased activity, but only Brody, who is clinging to a support for dear life, can see the blips and hear the chatter. Hooper is leaning out to look at the Flicka.

Hooper is examining the Flicka, tying a towline to it.

The light picks its way across the ruined boat. The rail where a cleat once was is broadly scarred down to the raw timber, and the heady cleat has been torn bodily out of the hull, ripped out screws and all.

Something he has seen moves Hooper.

BRODY

HOOPER

He sticks his head over the side, into the black water.

BRODY

HOOPER

Blip, chatter, blip, chatter.

Hooper moves to get a better look, the boat rocks in the swell and from his movement, Brody clutches the rail in a death-grip.

Hooper goes below decks, getting into his wet suit, buckling on a weighted belt, holding a mask and hot flashlight.

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

Hooper takes a last few breaths, orients himself, takes a long, hard look at the quiet, open ocean, and falls into the sea.

He is studying the surface, trying to follow Hooper’s movements. Brody is forcing himself to stay at the edge of the boat by sheer willpower and grim determination. Brody is fascinated by the sea like a bird facing a cobra. He is very much alone. He grasps a flashlight or boathook as a fragile defense against the unknown.

Beep, chatter, blip.

Hooper descends in a froth of bubbles. Warily he turns a full circle with his hotlight. At first we see nothing out of place about the Flicka except that it is lying so low in the water. But as Hooper travels the bottom looking for damage, he comes across a jagged hole two-thirds of the way forward.

The hole is about the size of a basketball, and the wood around it has been bashed and splintered. Hooper explores the hole with his hands, then takes the knife from its sheath and begins to dig at something. Whatever it is comes free in his hand. As he studies his find, his light wanders upward, pointing directly into the dark hole. Hooper looks up...

Ben Gardner’s dead face stares out through the hole in the Flicka, eyes and mouth gaping in frozen horror, his skin pinched like a prune.

bumps his head in trying to get away, seems to yell through escaping bubbles. We hear the gasping shout as a bubbling roar in the ears. His mask fills with water as he flails for the surface. Miscalculating, he bumps into the hull of his own boat, shocked, dismayed, his system jangling with adrenaline shock, his hands open, and the object he pried loose from the hull drifts down and out, falling into the eternity of the ocean bottom. He finally bursts through the surface.

He is gasping for breath, his whole body vibrating with urgency. The salt water in his lungs combines with the adrenaline in his blood to deprive him of speech.

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

Hooper, despite his shock and surprise, is strangely elated, almost giddy with the wonder of his discovery.

HOOPER

Brody sinks weakly into a chair. Brody huddles in the stern, Hooper kicks the engine in with a roar, and still a-shiver with excitement, turns the boat and its grim tow back to port.

Next to the “Amity Welcomes You” billboard is a group of selectmen, Vaughn, Meadows, Hendricks, and another deputy standing by with paint and brushes. Brody’s wagon is there, along with a few other cars. Busy late afternoon traffic is starting to pile up as early weekenders and curiosity seekers slow down to see what’s happening.

Behind the billboard, Brody and Hooper have gotten Vaughn to one side. They are making a closely reasoned presentation to him.

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

VAUGHN

HOOPER

BRODY

VAUGHN

HOOPER

VAUGHN

BRODY

VAUGHN

HOOPER

BRODY

VAUGHN

He leads Brody around to the front of the billboard, on which we see that some pranksters have painted a huge shark fin in the water behind the swimmer, so she looks now like a frantic bather fleeing a pursuing monster.

VAUGHN

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

VAUGHN

BRODY

VAUGHN

Two cavernous iron doors. Then a crack of vertical light as six burly crewmen muscle them apart. The Amity ferry landing is approaching, people in colorful outfits waiting dockside for the first filled-to-capacity shuttle of the summer season and –

Bach’s Little Fugue is the musical accompaniment to this wholly visual montage of disembarkation. The next two minutes should be treated like a “short film” taking into account all of the colors, episodes, faces and behavior of a variety of Americans who colonize Eastern resort communities for the ninety-day season.

Intercut with this montage is Brody’s home, where Ellen, Hooper and Brody are in sweaty, gritty all-out effort to enlist some support. Elements in this montage include:

A. A train of cars trundling down the ramp, bumper to bumper.

B. Young Beautiful People from Princeton, Yale, NYU, wearing knapsacks, toting luggage, babies riding in papoose rigs, energized children, senior citizens holding hands on the pedestrian ramp, a few wheelchairs.

C. Hooper, bent over the phone: “I know it’s a long weekend, could you get me his home phone number?

D. Sidewalk vendors hawking “Shark Killed” souvenirs, big photo “Personality Posters” of the dead tiger shark hung on the dock.

E. Brody: “You’re acting senior officer? Where’s Chief Petty Officer Feldman? Where’s the Coast Guard Executive Officer?”

F. Souvenir stands selling Genuine Sharks Teeth from The Amity Killer Shark, Captured This Week.

G. Amity Cab Company, small blue Toyotas lined up with their college student drivers like a bomber wing.

H. Hooper: “Well then, operator, could you try him in the dining room?”

I. Brody: “All I get is a recording. Is there some other number I could try...?”

J. Station wagons with pale winter faces pressed anxiously to the window. Cadillacs with Rear Admirals at the helm, their wives with blue hair remembering the way from years before.

K. Hooper: “When did he check out? Did he leave another phone number?”

L. Brody: “How can I reach him in Chambers if he’s not in Chambers?”

M. Little Karate Hands breaking picket fences.

N. Some local delinquents about 10 or 12 years old, towing behind their bicycles a little dead sand shark with signs: “Amity Monster Shark.” “Killed Here.” 5 Cents a Hit.” Etc.

Then six blonde and tanned Coney Island meatballs descend the ramp. They all wear Men’s Club Lifeguard patches and matching collegiate windbreakers. They scour the landing, looking for someone to save.

The boat is empty. Everybody heading inland, anticipating the best Fourth of July ever. Already there is debris on the docks and the cleaning crew works away at it.

As Bach’s Little Fugue ends, the six burly crewmen lean their combined weight against the Cathedral doors, closing out the light and locking in the trade. The doors latch shut with a resounding clang!

He is studying everything, trying to make sure he has it covered as well as possible. He almost doesn’t hear the approaching roar of a small helicopter until it settles down behind him, and a Flying Officer gets out, starched, pressed fatigues, a flawless fatigue baseball cap, and slick dark aviator’s sunglasses. The Steve Canyon of Amity. He presents Brody with a clipboard.

OFFICER

BRODY

OFFICER

Brody signs. The Officer shakes his head as Brody makes an error.

BRODY

OFFICER

Brody complies, shaking his head. The Officer snaps him a salute, jogs lightly back to his idling copter, buckles in, and gives Brody a “thumbs up” as he lifts off in a flurry of sand and ice-cream wrappers.

And this is it – the Dawn Patrol, the only forces that the frantic phone calling produced. Hendricks, and the regular summer extra deputies. The lifeguards. Half a dozen state troopers. Some deputies from neighboring towns, and a Coast Guard ensign with a handful of regulars in work dungarees.

Some of Hooper’s friends from the institute.

Brody and Hooper, badly in need of sleep, are watching the crew straggle in. Already the first of the holiday beach-goers are piling out of their cars in a brightly colored cascade of beach balls, umbrellas, blankets, portable bar-b-ques, radios, sun visors, reflectors, rafts, balls, tubes, and newspapers.

Hooper watches one such group: A Family of Ten getting out of a camper-van. He watches in dismay as the family bumbles onto the beach for a day of fun in the sun.

Brody addresses his troops, such as they are.

BRODY

The Men ad lib responses: “Happy to do it,” “Any time,” “When’s lunch?” “I hate holidays,” etc.

ENSIGN

He nods to his men, who head for some Boston Whalers (or similar boat with surf-riding capability) and push off into the surf to patrol the swimming areas.

BRODY

Everyone kind of nods acknowledgment.

HOOPER

BRODY

In a shed near the bandstand, a half-dozen pinball and arcade machines sucking quarters from holiday beach-goers. A mechanical shark traverses the screen, is hit with an electric harpoon and red “blood” blossoms from its side, indicating a hit.

Sounds of electronic gadgetry, people having fun. Meadows is there writing it all up for the paper. A move away from the screen of this particular machine reveals the arcade, the parking lot, and, finally, the beginnings of the panorama of the beach that July 4th has created.

four foot surfer’s swell curls and crashes on shore, riderless. The broad sandy beach is a mosaic of summer color as one thousand vacationers practice fun in the sun, but not in the water. Hot dog stands and ice cream vendors are everywhere.

A half-dozen lookout lofts. As many handsome lifeguards with Walkie-Talkies strapped to their trunks and loud-hailers at arm’s reach. Bored, two of the hot dogs train their binoculars on some local color.

A TV Mobile Unit Van is setting up: cables snaking to cameras, a camera with a big sports zoom sitting on the platform atop the truck, a spiffy announcer-type in a blazer with his station’s call letters on the pocket. Inside the darkened control room, we can see the pale blue squares of monitors in a mosaic against one wall, facing the switcher.

Hooper is methodically patrolling in his boat. Tactically flanking a three-hundred-yard apron of black repellent are four small watch-boats. A tiny pleasure boat darts around the repellent line. Farther out, crossing back and forth, are patrol boats. To top it all off, a Coast Guard helicopter hovers and patrols three hundred feet above.

At least eight monitors, reflecting the outputs of three cameras and two tape machines, as well as line, preview, and effects monitors.

MONITOR: CAMERA 1: Holding on a group of happy citizen-bathers as they unpack their gear, wave to camera, run into the water.

MONITOR: CAMERA 2: The Repellent Line, set in place by Coast Guardsmen in small boats, setting out floats, dumping repellent into the ocean.

MONITOR: CAMERA 3: Close on the Bandstand, where Amity’s band is playing lilting patriotic airs.

After we’ve seen this activity, we can take a look at what’s going on: the preparation of the tape segment for the six o’clock news.

TV DIRECTOR

On the “Tape 1” and “Line” monitors, we see Vaughn being interviewed by the Announcer in the blazer.

ANNOUNCER

VAUGHN

MONITOR: CAMERA 1: As Vaughn speaks to us on the monitors, the monitor for Camera 1 pans over to show a Sightseeing Bus pull up in the parking area, and a horde of media vultures spilling out, carrying cameras with long lenses and tripods, telescopes, sunshades and parasols, all the equipment of the curious and none of the equipment of the holiday bather or swimmer.

TAPE 1 AND LINE MONITORS: Close on the Announcer, Vaughn out of the picture.

ANNOUNCER

HOOPER

Hooper’s voice fades off as someone at the mixer panel dials his mike off, and brings up the Announcer’s lavalier.

ANNOUNCER

The camera pans off him to a happy family headed for the beach.

MONITOR: CAMERA 3: Zooms in on the puffing face of the tuba player.

MONITOR: CAMERA 2: Brody and the Announcer.

MONITOR: TAPE 1 and LINE: Back on the Announcer, his lips moving, but his sound turned off. We hear, instead, the sound from Monitor Camera 2, Brody and the same Announcer.

BRODY

TV DIRECTOR

MONITORS: CAMERAS 1, 2 and 3: The cameras seek out the appropriate activity as the Director calls for it.

ASSISTANT DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR

Starts showing us the assembled interview segment we’ve just seen, starting with the Announcer’s opening remarks.

ANNOUNCER V.O. MONITOR

His voice is dialed under as the Announcer himself appears in the control room to watch himself on the monitors.

ANNOUNCER LIVE

DIRECTOR

As Vaughn begins his spiel again, the other monitors show us the action on the beach.

VAUGHN V.O.

DIRECTOR

ANNOUNCER

ASSISTANT DIRECTOR

CAMERAMAN’S VOICE O.S.

DIRECTOR

Vaughn is in his shirtsleeves, having slipped out of his jacket.

He mops his brow, and surveys the beachfront. At this moment, there’s nobody swimming. He approaches a familiar Selectman, nods hello, and squats beside him on the sand.

VAUGHN

SELECTMAN

VAUGHN

On an adjoining blanket, a spirited Ruth Gordon type is sitting, watching brightly as her manservant, a polished Eric Harrison type, prepares some tea from a thermos.

WOMAN

ARTHUR THE BUTLER

He puts down the tea service, and leads her towards the water.

At the edge of the sea, she stops, and he walks in.

ARTHUR

He ducks his head under for a final look around. His dripping head rises triumphantly from the surf.

ARTHUR

She starts into the water, he takes her parasol, escorting her the rest of the way into the ocean.

WOMAN

Encouraged by the sight of the Woman and Arthur, and Vaughn’s quiet urgings, people begin to wander into the surf, a few at first, and then a rush, as people plunge in and begin enjoying the pleasures of ocean bathing. The Selectman goes in, his family follows, Vaughn watches it all, beaming.

Hendricks is on the radio while a Coast Guard spotter works the sonar.

HENDRICKS

Pan to the water.

As before, 400 pairs of enticing, yummy swimmers’ legs, kicking like animated hors d’oeuvres.

A breathtaking view. The copter spotter looks down with naked eye and binoculars.

COPTER SPOTTER

HENDRICKS

He is walking down the beach, threading his way through the happy hordes. Meadows nods “hello.”

VOICES

MEADOWS

A group of youngsters playing with Michael Brody’s dinghy.

They are hauling it toward the surf.

BRODY

Michael turns as Brody trots toward him.

BRODY

MICHAEL

BRODY

MICHAEL

BRODY

MICHAEL

TV cameramen are packing up their gear. For them it’s a wrap

Suddenly his Walkie-Talkie fizzes, and the Copter Spotter’s voice overloads the speaker.

COPTER SPOTTER

Guns are up, heads turning everywhere.

HENDRICKS

COPTER SPOTTER

The Coast Guard sonar operator spots it and pales. A slick black dorsal fin is slicing a wake toward the swimming area.

SONAR OPERATOR

Rigid and choked, he almost breaks the “send” button trying to transmit.

BRODY

A lifeguard in a loft behind him begins blowing on his whistle.

shouting hysterically.

BRODY

Dozens of bathers halfway out of the water, turn to see. More whistles, and they start toward shore. We hear panicky voices ad-libbing; “Shark,” “Look Out,” etc. The loudhailers sounding more urgent now, and a contagious dread seizes one person after another. Entire groups of people begin pulling toward shore, some of them obviously trying to control a growing hysteria in others.

are converging, heading toward the repellent line as if tracking an underwater shadow. The fin is beyond the repellent cordons and heading into the crowds.

Caught on the other end of the line, he is wheeling in a broad, hot-dogger’s circle turn, headed back.

People begin screaming. Kids are suddenly separated from their parents. Others seem to forget how to swim. One myopic little girl has her glasses bumped off and she begins to cry in blinded panic. Ellen Brody looks around frantic.

The riflemen in the boats are trying to get a bead, but too many civilians create a hazard. The Coast Guardsmen attempt to sever the repellent cord to gain access to the bathing area and the heaving fin.

This is a confirmation of our worst dread – a full-blown headlong water panic. Screaming vacationers claw their way over the bodies of the less able. Some literally attempt to walk over the bobbing heads and glistening backs of others pulling for dry land.

Horrified faces. Some are stunned and wandering in slow, tentative circles, while others are helped out by friends.

Five people try to mount a rubber raft.

Ugly reminders that each of us is Number One.

Brody enters shot, yelling into his walkie-talkie, someone charges past him to help an old man out of the water.

Dragging the helpless from the surf. Tears well in Brody’s eyes. The screaming is deafening. The TV unit is hopping up and down in rage and frustration.

TV DIRECTOR

One thousand survivors pack the beach, standing absolutely still. A numbing cold sets in, and people shiver against each other.

Muted sobs, whimpering, coughing.

The six burly lifeguards huddle together like Cub Scouts.

The monstrous black fin turns a slow circle as two Coast Guardsmen manage to cut their own repellent line. All boats converge on the dynamic fin. Men raise their guns to fire. Others adlib nautical commands in a uniquely calculated fashion.

It slips sideways, revealing for the first time a tiny blue snorkel. Then appears the faces of two youngsters whom we will recall from the coven behind the dune. The fin bobs back, a beaverboard replica attached to a partially submerged surfboard. One youngster looks up and is greeted by:

Twenty rifles and shotguns pointed directly at him. Surrounding him on three sides. Some of the policemen start to lower their guns – struck dumb.

He throttles back suddenly, subsiding into his own wake, his eyes still restlessly searching.

his only defense, he begins to cry – and feebly raises his hands in unconditional surrender.

The narrow estuary leading into the half-mile is rough today.

Two children digging in the sand and unaware of the beach panic one hundred yards away look up, and the little girl points.

is cruising through the narrows and toward the busy pond.

He sees it, and jams his throttle forward. He steers with one hand, fumbling urgently for his walkie-talkie with the other.

The circle of boats around the little pranksters, the crowds huddled on the beach, Hooper’s boat suddenly arrowing towards the estuary, leaving a huge boiling wake.

He catches Hooper’s boat out of the corner of his eye. Curious, he follows its progress. It’s urgency finally communicates itself to Vaughn, who begins a shambling trot across the dunes towards a rise overlooking the estuary.

Vaughn gets there just in time to see the disaster. He watches, helpless, trying to shout, out of breath. Stunned.

Michael is tacking full-sail in his boat with a friend, Kit.

Kit is admiring the shark’s tooth necklace around his own neck while Michael rubs some water on the scratches left by it.

The fin, huge, black and real, crosses behind them. They are not yet aware. The fin seems to circle and return. It heads toward Michael’s boat when another small dinghy gets in its way – a weekend novice just finishing a thermos of coffee when he is “bumped.” The entire boat is overturned. Michael sees the fin now as it collides with him, the entire bow lifting out of the water and rolling over on the port side.

Michael and Kit are thrown head first.

Three heads in the water come up sputtering, the fin between them crossing back. Michael freezes. The fin comes directly at him, growing into the sky, passing him so close he could touch it, but ignoring him as it follows the flailing and panicked weekend novice. Catches him. Michael watches. That all too familiar explosion of water – a choked off scream – the head and upper torso of the novice passing Michael swiftly as though being carried off – a current of blood trailing behind.

THE VICTIM

A renewed cry of shark!

He turns. Oh God! Running through the slogging sand.

A sudden turn. She runs.

He’s got the walkie-talkie to his mouth.

HOOPER

Three boats racing to carry out the orders. The black fin re-passing the two children, racing to get out. Hooper reaches the mouth before the others. The fin won’t veer off. It smacks into the little vessel, bumping it aside. The fin is left racing into open water. Blood leavings. Hooper leaping over the side, slogging towards Michael.

Copter roars in buzzing the shark, but too late.

They are pulling Michael out of the water as Hooper splashes up. Michael is conscious but in shock – his eyes staring at nothing.

BRODY

People gather and Brody snatches beach towels out of their hands. They cover Michael and carry him off the beach, feet raised above his head.

Michael is wheeled out in the bed. Brody and Ellen are there.

Sean is sleepy in Brody’s arms. Vaughn is waiting in the hall.

NURSE

ELLEN

MICHAEL

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

Ellen exits.

BRODY

VAUGHN

BRODY

VAUGHN

BRODY

VAUGHN

BRODY

VAUGHN

BRODY

VAUGHN

BRODY

Vaughn signs, and Brody takes the paper and exits.

Brody and Hooper are approaching Quint’s house. They enter through the big wooden doors, into another circle of Hell.

Smoke and steam from two big oil drums sitting over fires fills the air. Quint and his mate, Herschel, are grinding pieces of pilot whale into chum. The whale lies bloody on the floor, its ruined carcass adding to the stench of other sharks being boiled in the drums, their tails suspended in the air.

Diesel fumes and decay fill the air, and tools, ropes, broken bits of iron and engine parts litter the floor. Wall hangings of rope and floats, and buoys, barrels, tackle and gear all conspire to frame the killing floor.

Brody and Hooper navigate the obstacle course.

BRODY

HOOPER

QUINT’S VOICE

He emerges from the steam and smoke.

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

Brody tastes.

QUINT

Herschel interrupts. He’s stopped working, and is wiping his hands on a bloody rag.

HERSCHEL

Quint wheels to face him.

HERSCHEL

QUINT

HERSCHEL

QUINT

HOOPER

Quint turns to see this new voice, and starts walking towards him.

BRODY

QUINT

BRODY

HOOPER

QUINT

HOOPER

QUINT

HOOPER

QUINT

Hooper ties the knot effortlessly.

HOOPER

QUINT

He takes Hooper’s hands in his own big bloody fists, and feels them as he talks.

QUINT

HOOPER

BRODY

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

BRODY

The Mate is loading. He hands Quint the items on his check list as Quint takes them aboard.

QUINT

As he talks, we see Hooper coming down to the dock. Wheeling a wagon behind him are two long-haired Research Assistants from the Institute. On the wagon, among other things, is a big shark cage. At dockside, Hooper checks his list, as he signs for his issue.

HOOPER

ASSISTANT

HOOPER

ASSISTANT

HOOPER

QUINT

HOOPER

Hooper sees his gear approaching.

Quint sees Hooper approaching with the large cage.

QUINT

HOOPER

QUINT

Hooper indicates “me.”

QUINT

Hooper nods. Quint sings “Spanish Ladies” half to himself.

HOOPER

She’s carrying a little plastic shopping bag, he’s wearing shiny new foul weather gear, bundled up, sweaty, uncomfortable.

She gives him as good a hug as she can manage under the circumstances.

ELLEN

She straightens his coat, and gives him a shaving kit to carry aboard with his toiletries. From the deck, Quint whistles derisively.

QUINT

ELLEN

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

ELLEN

Brody nods, and holds her hand for a wordless moment.

QUINT O.S.

There is a sputter and roar as the Orca’s diesels kick on.

BRODY

ELLEN

BRODY

They laugh together, and exchange a short, fierce kiss.

QUINT

Its diesels chugging, the Orca pulls away from the pier.

Ellen has already resolutely turned her back on it, and is walking off the dock back onto dry land.

Quint has set a course out towards the open sea. He lashes the wheel, and jumps down to address Hooper and Brody, who are standing together in the stern.

QUINT

He laughs at his joke. This is probably something he tells all his charters.

QUINT

He starts moving gear around, preparing chum barrels, setting hooks, Hooper gives him a hand, Brody stays out of the way.

It is quiet as the Orca drifts along in the current, a wide chum slick spreading behind it. A couple of flag buoys spread along our perspective show us the miles the boat has gone.

Quint spots something in the water – a small blue shark attracted by the chum. He rigs a small pole with a piece of bait, and throws it over the side.

QUINT

The shark takes the bait, Quint brutally and efficiently sets the hook, and reels the shark alongside. He hauls it part way out of the water, and sticks it with a gaff. Hooper and Brody watch.

Tailrope dropping on him. Gaffed and bleeding, the shark is immobilized by Quint’s practiced hands. He takes one of his big knives and poses for a moment beside the struggling fish.

QUINT

He slices into the shark’s underbelly. We hear the sound of entrails plopping into the water. Brody is almost retching, and Hooper is just displeased.

The gutted shark swimming in circles biting at its own entrails.

Fins closing in on the wounded shark.

QUINT

A boil of water and the flash of fins and teeth as the local sharks erupt in a feeding frenzy, jaws snapping, blood spewing, a sudden display of the fury and blind predatory drive of the fearsome species.

HOOPER

QUINT

The Orca is drifting in neutral. The ocean is like gelatin, the sun sucking heat waves from its surface. Brody at the stern, handkerchief on his head to protect from further sunburn, has been handed the slimiest job on a shark hunt: the ladling out of chum. There are several empty chum barrels. A flag buoy bobs in the wake of the boat, another waits to be tossed over the side. Brody is reeling with nausea. He opens his overnight kit and takes out a handkerchief and some Old Spice after-shave. He pours the after-shave into the cloth, presses it to his nose. Hooper is also in the stern.

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

HOOPER

QUINT

Quint opens a can of beer and drains it in one long pull, crushing the empty and throwing it over the side. Hooper drains his coffee from a styrofoam cup, and cracks it in his hand with a silly “plup.” He stows the pieces in an empty chum barrel.

QUINT

Brody goes to unlash a fresh barrel, but can’t figure out the knots. He finally tugs on a piece of rope, and it all comes loose... barrel, shark cage, and, most important, Hooper’s tanks, clattering and rolling on the deck.

HOOPER

QUINT

The men are in different positions on the boat. Hooper on the flying bridge. Quint in the stern, Brody hanging over the rail, puking.

Quint takes a wide red strip of whale meat and a gnarled squid from the garbage pail, and searches for a No. 2 hook rig. He holds up a strip of whale.

HOOPER

QUINT

Brody shades his eyes from the white sun as Quint baits up.

BRODY

QUINT

HOOPER

Quint sits in the fighting chair. He casts off, murmuring as the line feeds out.

QUINT

Quint at ease in his chair, Brody near him, practicing tying knots. The line starts to move, a few feet at a time; both men watch. Then the line whizzes off the reel. Brody jumps up. Hooper springs to the deck. Quint puts his hand on the drag and addresses the situation softly.

QUINT

Quint tightens drag and strikes. The line goes whizzing out.

Brody runs to Quint’s side. Hooper springs up to the flying bridge.

BRODY

QUINT

Brody goes to get water, the boat surges, he staggers. Brody pours water on the screaming reel, nearly unspooled now.

Hooper is turning the boat around and the line changes direction.

QUINT

Hooper steers it sharply.

QUINT

HOOPER

Again the line changes direction, down this time.

QUINT

Quint reeling in like mad.

QUINT

He ad libs brief instructions to Brody as the line rushes out and there is less tension. Quint is horsing up and down, reeling in.

QUINT

The line is almost vertical, and Quint shows a hint of bafflement. He reels in suspiciously.

QUINT

HOOPER

QUINT

Hooper is rushing down.

HOOPER

QUINT

The leaders show above the water line. Brody is wide-eyed, waiting for that first look.

BRODY

QUINT

HOOPER

Hooper snaps the rope onto the leader and holds on.

QUINT

Before he realizes what’s happening, Brody is clumsily clutching at the big rod, appalled. Quint skips away for a flying gaff. He picks one, turns...

That’s when the leader lashes free, sending Hooper crashing backward in a serious fall, and the rod whips at Brody’s forehead, drawing blood. Quint snatches up the rod and reels in.

The wires have been bitten through.

QUINT

HOOPER

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

Hooper shakes off his dizziness and obeys. Brody watches Quint rig up a new leader, hook up the same bait.

BRODY

QUINT

Brody goes inside to inspect his forehead.

QUINT

HOOPER

QUINT

Hooper cuts the engines as Quint swings nimbly down. He stands stock still on the main deck, motioning Brody to be silent.

Then picking up the newly rigged rod, Quint softshoes it over to the chair. About to sit down, he freezes.

looking hard at something.

staring, eyes widening.

moving in, surprised, interested, fascinated.

We see the shark. First the fin... then the head and upper jaws, ten or twenty yards off the side of the boat. It finally submerges, its tail giving a final slap.

He puts his rod away and stares at it. And stares. And stares.

Hooper is the first to break the silence.

HOOPER

QUINT

Hooper is nearly beside himself with a strange ecstasy. He leaps toward his gear.

QUINT

BRODY

Quint ignores him and moves off into the pilot house, where he swiftly takes out his green case, and opens it to begin to assemble something inside it. Brody is alone on the deck with Hooper.

BRODY

Hooper is contained in his own excitement. He has finally come up with what he was looking for – an expensive Nikon through which he peers intently at the shark alongside. He is talking half to himself as he fine-tunes the range finder and focus.

He is squeaking and bubbling in an unsuppressed emotional boil.

HOOPER

He is assembling the Greener harpoon gun, deftly screwing on the long wooden stock, the heavy steel barrel, and big shaft with the wicked barbs, the frame all rigged with line. Past him, on the deck, we can still see Hooper. As Quint is working with the gun, the radio suddenly squawks into life.

RADIO VOICE V.O.

Quint snaps the mouthpiece to his lips.

QUINT

RADIO VOICE V.O.

QUINT

ELLEN’S VOICE

QUINT

ELLEN’S VOICE

QUINT

ELLEN’S VOICE

QUINT

He snaps off the radio, and, for good measure, pulls the plug from the power source.

The big shark is slicing through the water just below the surface, its fin high, the big gray back glistening, the teeth gleaming.

HOOPER

He is positioning Martin frantically, trying to include Brody, the shark, and the Orca in the same frame. Quint finishes with the gun, and as a final gesture, snaps an explosive cartridge into the breech. He empties the box of cartridges onto the table, snatches up a big handful, and drops them into a pocket, and heads out on deck, bound for the bow pulpit.

Quint appears with the harpoon gun. He throws one end of the line to Hooper.

QUINT

He indicates the barrels on the foredeck.

QUINT

Quint moves up toward the bow, Brody goes up to the flying bridge to take the wheel, Hooper starts for the foredeck, but stops to rummage in his kit, throwing gear around as he desperately hunts for something.

QUINT

He finds what he’s looking for. A small, powerful strobe unit, waterproofed, a miniature signal beacon. He triggers it, and it begins to pulse with a light we can see even in the sun.

Hooper scampers to the foredeck and begins to rig the light to the first barrel, as the shark begins to surface near the bow.

QUINT

He guides Brody with hand signals. Brody tries urgently to get it right, not to oversteer, to try to hold the big boat with its throbbing diesels on the course that Quint is indicating.

QUINT

Hooper is rigging like crazy.

Brody steering f.g., Hooper on the foredeck with the barrels, Quint leaning out over the pulpit, the gun at the ready, the shark crossing inexorably in front of them.

Agonizing over his shot as the shark approaches, glancing back to see if the line is properly rigged and Hooper is clear of it.

QUINT

The shark is in position, Hooper shouts, a moment too late.

HOOPER

Quint fires. The harpoon slams into the shark behind his head, half-way along the back in front of the big dorsal fin.

QUINT

The rope snaps out in a blur of violent motion, Hooper jumps back, and the barrel leaps out of its rack, pulled by the line rigged to the harpoon. It bounds forward and into the sea, past Quint, who is already reloading, mounting another steel shaft. In the distance, the barrel bobs and skips violently in the water, dragged by the shark in his merciless moves.

QUINT

Hooper, furious with himself, runs for the flying bridge to take the helm from Brody.

Hooper has snatched the wheel, and is ramming the throttle forward as he spins the wheel in a frantic 180 degree turn.

HOOPER

His eyes dart about the ocean, looking for the barrel, as he hot-dogs the ship around in a violent expression of his own disgust with himself.

HOOPER

He spins the wheel again, trying to make the big boat handle like a formula speedster. The decks tip and the rigging sways under the sudden strain. Brody is caught unaware, and tumbles off his feet, sliding across the deck to fetch up against a wall. the M1 Rifle is close to his hand. He stares at it.

Hooper is anguished, intense, trying to find the shark, spinning the wheel, compounding his error, tipping the boat in rolling turns as he crosses his own wake. Quint has turned his back to the sea, and is in the pulpit looking up at Hooper, staring at him, excluding everything else.

As Quint folds his arms and stares at Hooper, we realize the sun is going down, and it’s getting dark.

BRODY

QUINT

Hooper throttles back, and the roar of the diesels subsides and the boat resumes an even keel, slowly circling the ocean.

BRODY

QUINT

Throttled back to slow ahead, the boat circles the water endlessly, staying over the shark like an avenging angel. Its running lights gleam in the night, and a glow lights the interior of the pilot house. A bright strobe glints on the water winking once like a firefly.

Brody and Hooper at the table, Quint at the wheel, keeping his eye on the light.

QUINT

He corrects course slightly to keep the barrel buoy in sight.

Hooper is sitting at the table, morose. Brody is staring at a couple of open cans of beans or beef stew, or some other crappy rations Quint has on board. Dirty spoons stuck in the open cans show us this has not been a formal dinner. Quint fumbles on the chart shelf and produces some of his home brew.

He takes a pull, and hands it to Hooper, who takes a double.

Brody touches the fresh abrasion on his forehead, where the fishing rod caught him.

Quint bends forward and pulls his hair aside to show something near the crown.

QUINT

Brody looks politely. Hooper stirs himself.

HOOPER

Quint is amused. He presents his own formidable forearm.

QUINT

HOOPER

Brody is fascinated. Quint and Hooper take a long pull from the bottle.

QUINT

HOOPER

He hauls up his pants leg, revealing a wicked white scar.

HOOPER

QUINT

He starts rolling up his own dirty pants leg.

QUINT

Brody is drawn into their boasting comparisons. He secretly checks his own appendix scar, decides not to enter the contest.

HOOPER

QUINT

They toast each other. Brody looks around, sees the strobe blink once through the darkened window.

QUINT

He starts lowering his pants to reveal a place on one hip where the tissue is scarred and irregular.

QUINT

HOOPER

Hooper is pulling at his shirt, trying to get it off, but it’s tangling its sleeves, and won’t come undone.

HOOPER

Brody lends a hand. The shirt slips part way off.

HOOPER

The two men raise their mugs in a toast.

QUINT

He drinks, Hooper follows.

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

Brody is looking at a small white patch on Quint’s other forearm.

BRODY

QUINT

HOOPER

QUINT

BRODY

HOOPER

Quint remembering.

QUINT

Quint has just finished his story, and we are looking across the quiet night sea to the Orca slowly circling in the night, the warm light in the pilot house barely revealing the figures of the three men inside, the red and green running lights winking along the ship’s flanks. We hear the distant boom and drawn-out hoot of a whale.

BRODY

HOOPER

There’s a brief, eerie pause. Quint breaks the silence by muttering into song, which he slowly swells.

QUINT

Gradually, Hooper and Brody join in, and the pilothouse becomes a warm cozy place.

The Orca and its song in the night. In the foreground, the barrel and strobe light flash up into view, and behind them, the big dorsal fin surfaces, and glides ominously towards the ship.

The song is continuing, and we hear the barest hint of a scraping sound from the hull deep beneath the men. Quint’s eyes abruptly narrow as his sensitive ears are the first to hear the abrasion of his ship. Things vibrate on the shelves.

Quint stops singing, Hooper and Brody continue a duet. The scraping repeats, and Hooper now senses it. He drops out of the song, leaving Brody singing solo.

QUINT

As Brody hears this and is about to stop singing, the boat is suddenly bumped from below, and the gentle scraping turns to a violent assault somewhere on the understructure of the vessel. Water bubbles up into the hold. Brody starts, and looks at the radio. He is about to move towards it when Quint’s urgent instructions stop him.

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

He leaves Brody in the pilot house, and runs onto the deck, grabbing his M-1 rifle as he goes. Brody hits a switch and we hear the pumps starting.

Hooper is on the flybridge, starting the engines, but the diesels sound wrong.

QUINT

Hooper does.

HOOPER

The boat is assaulted again. Quint fires over the stern, emptying a clip into the water.

QUINT

Brody moves cautiously up to the bow.

QUINT

Hooper stands ready on the bridge, Quint pacing the stern deck.

QUINT

He jams a fresh clip into the M-1. The men scan the seas around them. Quint resumes their song, louder this time, more defiant.

QUINT

Hooper and Brody join in from their respective positions.

The men in place, singing, the water sparkling towards the horizon, the stars twinkling above. The sound of a distant whale in distant counterpoint.

Brody is at the wheel on the flying bridge, while Hooper and Quint have a hatch up on the stern, and are working together to repair the damaged rudder controls torn loose by the shark. Hooper is bucking the steel rod, while Quint is hammering away at the joint, trying to drive a new pin.

The engine is idling. Bits of iron clutter the deck, along with a few rough, outsized tools and greasy rags and gaskets.

QUINT

Brody tries to comply.

HOOPER

Quint hammers again.

QUINT

And we can. The Orca’s diesels are no longer smooth. Brody suddenly sees something, and points.

The barrel is surfaced directly ahead of them, just off the port side. They are drifting up to it.

BRODY

The strobe light winks at them. Quint holds up a hand: “Quiet!”

Everything stops as they watch the barrel coming slowly up on them.

QUINT

He takes a killing lance from the rack. Hooper gets a boathook.

QUINT

Hooper leans out gingerly, snagging the barrel with the hook.

It bobs lightly in the water, an innocent bystander. Hooper shifts his pole, takes hold of the rope, poling it in.

QUINT

Hooper gets the line and starts hauling it up. No resistance.

It comes easily over the transom into a coil on the deck. He and Quint exchange looks.

QUINT

Both men are draped over the side, their chins almost touching the water on the aft side. From the opposite starboard direction, fully unfastened from the barrel, comes the Great White. First the fin, then the conical nose and the upper border of wide, grinning teeth. It knifes through the water in absolute silence, propelling itself with tremendous speed toward the unsuspecting men.

His instincts shine – as does his newly-acquired sense of direction.

BRODY

They turn just in time, and a long spine-stretch saves them from instant decapitation. The Great White passes the transom, the harpoon still in its side and trailing five feet of chewed-off cable. It rolls on its side and looks at them as it passes.

Past the stern the huge tail lashes out, ripping the rope out of Quint’s hands, shearing a huge swath through the paint, peeling it off like a plane, taking one of the bronze letters out of “Orca.” The shark begins an arc to sea, its fin cutting the water, and starts circling the boat. Quint notices his cut hand, palm bleeding, realizing how close he came to losing it.

QUINT

The diesels start with a terrible grinding.

QUINT

HOOPER

Hooper slams the hatch, kicks the tools to one side, clearing the deck for action once again.

BRODY

QUINT

BRODY

Brody heads for the radio in the pilot house.

A perfectly terrible look comes over him. He raises up and starts after Brody. Brody disappears into the cabin. Quint pauses outside and sees:

his calloused hand grabs it up fiercely.

Brody picks up the radio, flicking on knobs and lights on the complex console.

QUINT O.S.

Quint appears, silhouetted in the hot light of the door, raising his bat.

QUINT

looking up in horror, covering his face.

Quint brings down the bat with all the strength he can summon.

Crash!

Sparks fly, lights blink and go out, plastic and sections of metal ricochet all over the cabin as Quint demolishes the ship-to-shore radio.

Quint takes a happy breath, winks at Brody and hands him the bat.

QUINT

Brody’s adrenaline turns his fear into rage. His glasses are cracked or broken by flying pieces of radio. He seizes the bat, and pound the shattered radio for emphasis.

BRODY

His tirade is interrupted by an urgent bellow from Hooper.

Pointing at the fin.

HOOPER

QUINT

QUINT

Hooper pulls the boat into a tight turn and Quint has a shot at the upward rolling flank. He sinks it with careful precision.

QUINT

Brody emerges from the cabin as the rope zips overboard, and the barrel, changing over, catapults into the air before plunging into the ocean in a cloudy splash.

BRODY

QUINT

Hooper can see the fin racing ahead of the barrel. Diving down. Up again – Quint prepares another iron. Brody is digging in his bag. He comes up with his 2” .357 service revolver.

QUINT

The engine thuds and knocks.

HOOPER

Suddenly the barrel gongs into the side of the Orca.

QUINT

Hooper skillfully avoids the speeding rope.

QUINT

Quint leans to one side, harpoon over his head. The Great White breaks water and...

QUINT

He sinks it deep. We hear shots. As the new rope whips out, Brody can be seen standing on the gunwale, in regulation police combat pistol stance, holding his .357 in both hands, firing at the shark’s head.

Quint shakes his head in amused disbelief at this, as the barrel goes over.

HOOPER

BRODY

QUINT

He has seen the two barrels pop to the surface.

QUINT

He yells to Hooper and Brody as he swings behind the controls.

QUINT

Quint steers “Slow Ahead,” engine protesting, as he maneuvers toward the moving barrels. Quint peers down, steering closer and closer.

QUINT

Together Brody and Hooper hook a barrel-rope and hold on for dear life as the shark changes course.

QUINT

Brody and Hooper pull in with all they are worth as Quint helps out by wheeling in a circle. He laughs to himself, enjoying the spectacle.

securing the rope to a cleat but allowing the barrel to hang overboard. Brody ties his now-perfect bowline adjacent cleat.

The boat is jarred violently from side to side as the underwater force of the Great White jerks and heaves them to and fro, up and down, side to side...

are both torn off their feet as the boat is thrust forward.

sees the fin ahead. It is pulling the boat.

QUINT

The shark leaps partially out of the water, and the sight is both horrifying and awesome. Its jaws break water, snapping at the ropes that have him snarled and frustrated.

Quint throws the Orca into neutral and shouts down:

QUINT

With that, Quint slides down to the prow, putting another shaft onto his gun, finding satisfaction in its heft and balance. The shark can be seen directly ahead, threshing closer.

QUINT

He fires the iron, and the shark veers downward in a gushing shower of spray.

They are trying to untie from the cleats, but both ropes are stretched too taut. They jump out of the way, falling flat on the deck as the ropes sweep over them, knocking over objects, skeetering across the deck. A tight jerking motion, and the Orca is dragged through the water – backwards. And much too fast. Water is splashing up over the transom in its backward wake. The engines groan and complain.

QUINT

Wrenched to one side, Quint is knocked from his feet.

A moment of slackness, and then a great surge of raw strength.

The rope snaps the cleats off, screws and splintered wood spraying – and the barrels fly over the water. They disappear beneath the turbulent grey surface.

The three men, breathing heavily, bruised and pouring sweat, look out at the blank water.

Pop – pop – pop. One, two, three, the barrels surface – ready for more.

QUINT

Brody looks down at his feet. There is salt water up to their shoe tops.

BRODY

QUINT

The barrels start a wide circle, each cuts through the water, pushing a wave before it and leaving a wake behind.

QUINT

Quint tosses Brody the hand pump, then picks up his M-1, and checks the load.

HOOPER O.S.

QUINT

The barrels approaching the Orca dip below the surface, one – two – three.

BRODY

Brody looks around. Hooper on the flying bridge searching in all directions. Quint is looking more appalled every second.

QUINT

BRODY

QUINT

Booming thud at the keel. Brody slides on the wet deck and Quint loses his footing, falling into Brody’s arms.

It seems the only place out of reach of the shark. Quint climbs up, Brody following him, reloading his pistol.

Just then, the barrels pop up ahead, veer left, and duck under.

QUINT

HOOPER

BRODY

The barrels have surfaced and we see the monster shadow sliding under the Orca, seemingly endless. Violent scraping sounds.

BRODY

QUINT

Quint is grimly silent. Brody senses that Quint is in the fight of (and for) his life.

The Orca taking evasive action. But the three barrels are closing the gap, the engines coughing and missing, destroying themselves with every rotation of the damaged shaft.

BRODY

QUINT

Hooper is jamming the throttle forward, but the engine is pounding and knocking wildly. The barrels circle and move in. Quint has his rifle ready.

HOOPER

He leaps to his gear, trying desperately to get his dart gun.

Just then, the shark attacks, breaking water and rising over the boat like a rocket; snout, jaws, pectoral fins, belly, falling sideways. A vast spray drenches the men. Quint fires into the belly, the bullets pocking the smooth whiteness.

HOOPER

The Orca shudders from side to side. From Hooper’s point of view we can the shark gripping the transom in his jaws, shaking the boat as he saws his massive head from side to side, trying to tear a chunk out of the very hull. Quint has reloaded and is firing into the fish. Brody has a wicked pointed gaff, and is swinging wildly at the snout, gashing and gouging it, trying for the eyes. The killing lust is on all three men.

QUINT

The boat surges, the shark gives a final unbalances wrench, and disengages. The dorsal fin circles off, beginning a wide loop around the boat.

The engine quivers and dies, the boat without power, rolling half awash, a wounded victim.

The fin dips, the barrels follow, the shark disappears beneath the waves. There is complete silence.

In the dead quiet, we can hear the lap of waves against the hull, the hoarse panting breathing of the men, the pings and pops of the cooling, dying engines.

He eyes the stern. Huge cracks and broken timber testify to the fury of the attack.

QUINT

HOOPER

BRODY

Quint and Hooper are assembling the shark cage, its shiny bars the only undamaged things on deck. Brody is working too, bolting the sections together.

HOOPER

The men are speaking in near whispers, quiet in the silence that surrounds them. Hooper is in his wet suit, adjusting weights, mask, tanks, etc. The cage is standing in the stern.

Quint runs a line from the gin pole to the roof section.

Hooper climbs in though the top.

HOOPER

Brody cranks the winch, hoisting cage and Hooper into the air. Quint balances the gin pole lines, Hooper crouching in the cage, examining it for stresses; satisfied, he holds out his hand. Quint puts the spear gun into it.

He examines his weapon, checking the power load, with the big wicked-looking syringe head uncapped to reveal its razor point.

HOOPER

Hooper inside, looking out the bars of the cage, gives Brody a reassuring smile, then pops his mouthpiece between his teeth and checks his regulator. Brody steps back, and with Quint guiding the cage, begins lowering it off the gin pole boom arm into the sea alongside the boat.

Brody and Hooper stare at each another as their faces pass, Hooper sliding down into the cold grey ocean.

As Hooper disappears beneath the surface, Quint and Brody exchange a long look between them.

Submerging. The sky, horizon, water line, clean fresh sea air then... the magnificent innerspaces, with bubbles sparkling in front of us.

as he floats to twenty feet Hooper never stops looking around 360 degrees. He removes the rubber guard from the needle and waits.

Their turning heads tell us that the barrels are still circling.

Suddenly, both heads stop turning.

The barrels have come to a stop. Delicately, they change course and meander toward the lowered cage.

His back is to us. He is just now completing a visual sweep and turns, eyes front into closeup and: fixes wildly on something monstrous... and fascinating.

The water is clear and shafts of sunlight streak downward in the blue. From the deep gloom – diving slowly, smoothly – comes the shark. It moves with no apparent effort, sinuous beyond comparison. As it nears the cage, it turns, and its ghastly length passes right in front of him: first the snout, then the jaw, slack and smiling, then the black eye.

Hooper tentatively reaches out. It is too far for the strychnine pole. The vinyl flesh is pocked with bullet holes, iron scars, gaffing hooks and strange open wounds that tinge the passing currents with pink.

The trailing barrels gong and scratch the keel of the Orca above. Brody and Quint leap back.

The shark has vanished into a cloud of rising silt. Hooper, expecting the shark to attack out of that same general direction, braces himself, pole extended through the bars, breathing faster, straining his eyes into the gloom and... we see that the shark attacking from behind him.

The cage is sent careening. Hooper grabs the bars for dear life. The shark has grabbed the steel struts in its brutal jaws, shaking the cage relentlessly from side to side, bending the bars like clothes hangers. Hooper can’t turn the pointed end of the pole around, his body jammed as far away from the non-rational attacker as possible.

Hooper is trapped.

The shark withdraws to get some running room then charges again. The bleeding snout thrust deeper into the yawing bars, the jaws snapping and twisting, two feet from Hooper’s torso, the tail thrusting it forward. Hooper drops the strychnine pole between the bars and it tumbles slowly toward rapture depth.

All the shark needs is one more good thrust before separating Hooper at the waistline. Through frantic bubbles Hooper fumbles with the overhead hatch cover, kicking up and out of the cage. The shark backpedals with its tail, but the broad head won’t shake loose.

Hooper rushes downwards, after the strychnine pole.

The shark twists free of the cage and arrows downward after Hooper.

Hooper nearly recovers the pole. Again it slips from his frightened grasp and this time disappears into a narrow abyss. Hooper turns and looks up.

The Great White is lunging at him, twenty feet above.

One of the barrel ropes snakes around the cage rope and pulls taut.

Turning to meet the monster which – though held back for a moment by the snarled rope – now surges forward.

The Orca is listing dangerously aft, the ginpole bent almost to the breaking point. Brody is in a frenzy trying to haul up the cage. Quint attaches the end of Brody’s rope to a hand-winch. The ginpole is splitting.

QUINT

The pole gives way, the rope whipping down on the gunwale... the pulling of the tonnage below is tipping the Orca, dragging it, but Quint won’t give up the winch. Brody hauls on the rope barehanded.

maneuvering downward, away from the jaws... Suddenly the crazed shark veers upward for the surface.

The winch is working faster now, Quint demonically winding it in. The crushed cage bangs against the hull then breaks water.

Brody is horrified. The cage is empty!

QUINT

BRODY

The shark breaks water right beside the Orca, rising with a great whooshing noise. It rises vertically, towering overhead, blocking out the sun. The pectoral fins seem to reach forward. The shark, in all of its monstrous glory, falls onto the stern of the boat with a shattering crash, narrowly missing Quint and Brody. It drives the stern underwater, the ocean pours in over the transom. The jaws snap from side to side. Brody flounders backwards away from it.

He is clinging to the mast for dear life, as the ship begins to tilt to stern, and everything starts to break loose around him.

The giant jaws are snapping irresistibly at everything: great chunks of wood torn out of the deck and superstructure.

Deck chair, irons, rope, gear, beercans, bottles, Brody’s bag, all are food for the insatiable maw blindly churning away.

Quint is clinging next to a rack of lances: he is enraged at this ultimate violation of his territory. He snatches up a lance and hurls himself at the shark with a wordless bellow.

The great head weaves side to side, the deck is at a treacherous incline, slippery with blood and seawater. Quint’s footing falters and slips, he stumbles at the Mouth of Hell, the big teeth seize him and snap.

Quint’s roar of rage and pain is choked off as his body is clamped between the grinding, sawing teeth, and his head and legs suddenly contort as the shark’s teeth meet across his torso. Blood gushes onto the deck. The remnants of his body tumble from the shark’s mouth.

Brody sees the horror, hears the screams – in his desperation, he tears loose one of Hooper’s remaining air tanks, and hurls it at the monster. It tumbles into the bloody well, wedging across the back of the mouth, the thick steel blocking the cruel jaws.

The shark’s head shakes even more violently, trying to clear the cold iron, but the tank is in to stay.

To avoid sliding into the jaws, Brody scrambles on the titling deck, bracing himself in the cabin door to avoid pitching down into the bloody mouth. He fights his way into the cabin, already a shambles.

Below him, on the deck, the shark lunges again, shifting weight so that the boat in now stern down, and listing to the side. Water from the sea pours into the cabin.

Another lunge by the shark. The huge snout and jaws slam up against the doorframe, blocking escape, bloody, gnashing.

More seawater. To stay in the cabin is to go down with the ship.

Brody clambers as far from the shark as he can, against the forward wall of the pilothouse. He sees the window Hooper used before. It’s blocked by barrels and debris. He breaks the side window highest above the water, edges out onto the battered bridge.

The shark rolls around, now half in the water. The ship is sinking, the sea is not a viable alternative. Brody climbs up into the flying bridge.

The shark is still lunging and snapping. Brody is forced to climb higher and higher as the ship slowly sinks beneath him.

He scrambles for his life onto the flying bridge, sees the M-1 stuck there, seizes it.

He is bracing himself, aiming the rifle, taking a bead on the steel tanks, silver gleaming in the bloody shark’s mouth. He fires. And fires. Bullets shatter the shark’s teeth, punching holes in the dripping snout.

With a muffled boom, the perfect symmetry of the shark is suddenly blown apart in a geyser of steel and blood as Brody’s shot hits the pressurized tank. A 30-foot cloud of water, steel, shark and debris covers the sky.

A gigantic convulsion hurls the Great White’s mangled body into the sea. The Orca slowly begins to turn over in its death roll.

The shark’s carcass floating down in a cloud of blood and debris.

A shadow clouds the waters, and the Orca’s mass begins to slip into the frame.

Emerging from beneath the surface, he raises his mask, spits out his mouthpiece and kicks toward Brody.

Brody is holding onto a cushion, barely afloat, relieved the shark is dead, yet stunned to see Hooper is still alive. The two men share weak laughter, which soon trails off.

HOOPER

BRODY

They swim through the debris, using two barrels as floats, as dozens of seagulls feast on shark remains on the surface.

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

BRODY

HOOPER

The two tiny, miserable heroes swim ashore as the credits roll.