There’s been chatter of Universal Pictures remaking Steven Spielberg’s 1975 Jaws since we launched this site in 2001.
Now, Spielberg is heading back to Universal with Amblin Partners, and out of this news came the question of whether or not Jaws was going to get the reboot.
Spielberg tells Deadline that he (personally) would never remake any of his own movies (even though films like Poltergeist still found a way to get remade).
“I would never remake one of my own movies — starting with Jaws — but there are Amblin titles in the library that could inspire new stories that were made popular by the films,” he said. “There isn’t a single title that I’ve earmarked, but yes, I would like to. I will be discussing that with Jeff (Skoll) and Ronnie (Meyer) and Donna (Langley).
“I would never remake Jaws,” he double clarified.
Adds the site: Besides, he joked, he’d have to get the permission from his attorney Bruce “Jaws” Ramer — which everyone knows is the town’s biggest legal shark — in order to use the name again.
What’s interesting here is that it sounds as if Spielberg is okay with mining the library for franchises to spin off. The latest Indiana Jones is the perfect example of him attempting to push the franchise in a new direction (with Shia Labeouf), even though it failed. I do like that he’s at least trying to keep Hollywood honest, even if that’s just smoke and mirrors.
Jaws is more than a financial success, it’s also historically important being that it was the first ever summer blockbuster. It’s because of Jaws that we get mega-huge blockbusters each and ever summer.
