Due to the massive success of the original film, Universal brought back Roy Scheider as Amity’s sheriff Brody to take on yet another human-munching great white shark, only this time he has to do it solo as the town mayor and everyone else doesn’t believe him.

Totally watchable sequel benefits from bringing back a handful of the original cast and though it is a tad silly at times and seems to focus a bit too much on the teenage characters for one’s liking (even if the "boat siege" last third is pretty darn good) it’s still an entertaining sequel that’s well-directed with plenty of nice-looking shots (Szwarc’s panning down from a lighthouse onto a beach is quite the shot).

While this continues the series trend of the follow-ups being poorer than the one before it this has to follow in Spielberg’s grand original - so it’s a given it wouldn’t be as good.

Some decent suspense, Schieder’s good performance (he makes Brody much more obsessed this time out) and a handful of memorable moments (the body pop-up and teen getting rammed into the boat stick-out) make this worthwhile.

The scene with a chopper would be cloned in later low-budget flicks (most notably 1980’s Great White) and though the shark looks a bit rubbery it’s not nearly on the lame level Jaws:The Revenge was.

Directed By: Jeannot Szwarc.
Written By: Howard Sackler, Dorothy Tristan.

Starring: Roy Scheider, Lorraine Gray, Murray Hamilton, Joseph Mascolo.

Picture Ratio: 2:35:1 Widescreen.

Picture Quality: Mmm mmm good. This is a 70's movie and they don't get a much better transfer than this. Bright colours, nice tones - pretty tasty.

Extras: For a sequel this one certainly got the special edition treatment. We get the trailers, a nice making of featurette, some interesting deleted scenes, a photo gallery, storyboards, production notes, bios, "shark facts", a look at John Williams score, actor Keith Gordon talking about the movie and finally "the French joke" which is a pointless 10 seconds.