Spielberg celebrates 50th anniversary Jaws exhibition

The ocean buoy that a woman swims past in the now-legendary opening scene of Jaws, is one of 200 pieces to be featured in an exhibition celebrating the 50th anniversary of the fright classic.

Speaking at the exhibition, Steven Spielberg mused about why anyone would take one of the movie props home, saying his primary concern at the time was keeping his job as a 26-year-old director amid unfolding disasters.

The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures is holding the first full show in its four years dedicated to a single film, as the 1975 blockbuster had a theatrical re-release last week.

Spielberg spoke to media at the museum after touring the exhibit, which takes visitors chronologically through the film's three acts, with some relic or recreation from virtually every scene.

The 78 year old described the exhibition as 'just awesome'.

Jaws has been essential to the Academy Museum, which opened in 2021 and is operated by the organisation that gives out the Oscars.

The only surviving full-scale mechanical shark from the production, nicknamed 'Bruce' by Spielberg after his lawyer, has permanently hung over the escalators since it opened.

Museum director Amy Homma said Bruce has become an 'unofficial mascot'.

The media preview was accompanied by a 68-piece orchestra playing John Williams' ominous score.

The exhibit includes a keyboard with instructions on how to play the two-note refrain that a generation of children learned to tap out on the piano.

Similar novelties include a dolly-zoom setup to which visitors can attach their phone and shoot their own face to recreate perhaps the film's most famous shot, star Roy Scheider's frightened gaze on the beach in the fictional town of Amity.

There is also a small scale-model of the film's mechanical sharks that patrons can manually operate as crew members did at the time.

Spielberg said the crew's camaraderie was the only thing that kept the production together, as the making of it was marked by endless waits due to unfavourable conditions, unwanted ships in the background and broken down equipment that led to the shoot going 100 days over schedule.

"I just really was not ready to endure the amount of obstacles that were thrown in our path, starting with Mother Nature," Spielberg said. "My hubris was we could take a Hollywood crew and go out into the Atlantic Ocean and shoot an entire movie with a mechanical shark. I thought that was going to go swimmingly."

People played a lot of cards. Others tried to reckon with seasickness.

"I've never seen so much vomit in my life," he said.

"The film certainly cost me a pound of flesh," he said, "but gave me a ton of career."