Steven Spielberg is well known for his long takes and a lot of them have been covered all over the internet. The one shot that hasn’t been shared is actually the longest single shot in JAWS. It runs for 2 minutes and 45 seconds and is also the longest single shot in any Spielberg film up to 2018.
Why hasn’t it been exposed before? Did you know it was the longest shot? I didn’t even know until a couple months ago as I was analyzing JAWS for the billionth time.
I think the reason this shot remained invisible for so long was the craftsmanship of the shot where Spielberg utilized these 5 techniques to make it work:
- BLOCKING of actors and constant positional changes
- CONFLICT within the characters to amp up the drama
- MOTION of the dolly across the entire shot
- HUMOR that releases tension within the scene
- FRAMING that is interesting and always changing
To maintain the interest of the viewers for almost 3 straight minutes with one shot…Spielberg used all these devices to render a compelling, dramatic, funny and informative scene that camouflaged its “one-take” existence.
Now that’s filmmaking!
Until next time…
There are 3 comments
I never thought about that.
Love this article or post! And love your content on all of your website. Thank You.
Great analysis! Never thought of that before.