This 49-Year-Old Epic Shark Horror Will Completely Change the Way You See Steven Spielberg's 'Jaws'

Audiences were not prepared for the intense spectacle of Jawsin 1975. While the film is credited with inventing the summer blockbuster, it also became a cultural phenomenon. However, along with its thrills and chills and its box office dominance came an unfortunate byproduct: sharks became everyone's greatest fear. This led to the depopulation of sharks, a result that both Stephen Spielberg and the writer of the original novel, Peter Benchley, deeply regretted. What had once been a mysterious predator of the deep was now cemented as a bloodthirsty cinematic villain. One year later, William Grefé’s Mako: The Jaws of Death swam into theaters. On the surface, it looked like another exploitation cash-in, the kind of low-budget knockoff eager to ride the coattails of Spielberg’s mega-hit. But Mako wasn’t just another Jawsploitation film. Instead, it turned the entire idea of the shark movie inside out. Where Jaws made sharks into monsters, Mako tried to give them a voice. It is, in many ways, the anti-Jaws.