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Jaws is an American thriller film that was released on June 20, 1975, directed by Steven Spielberg, and based on Peter Benchley's 1974 novel Jaws (paperback cover shown; for the film poster, see today's Picture of the Day). It stars Roy Scheider as police chief Martin Brody, who, with the help of a marine biologist (Richard Dreyfuss) and a professional shark hunter (Robert Shaw), hunts a man-eating great white shark that has attacked beachgoers at his summer resort town. The film was distributed by Universal Pictures to more than 450 screens, a wide release for the time. It was extensively marketed and followed by three sequels. Regarded as a watershed in motion picture history, Jaws was the prototypical summer blockbuster and the highest-grossing film of all time until Star Wars two years later; both films were pivotal in establishing the modern Hollywood business model. Jaws was in 2001 selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry. (Full article...)
