10 Things You Didn't Know About Jaws

4. Universal Sued the Makers of an Italian Jaws Rip-off Called 'The Last Shark'

In 1982, infamous Italian director Enzo G. Castellari directed 'The Last Shark' - a shameless Jaws knock-off. How shameless was it exactly? Well, not only does The Last Shark feature a small beach community being terrorised by a huge great white shark, but pretty much every other narrative beat from Jaws is included - such as an ignorant mayor who refuses to acknowledge the problem (until it swims up and bites him on the ass) and an explosive demise for poor old sharky. There€™s even actor Vic Morrow giving his penultimate performance as Ron Hamer €“ a rusty seadog with more than a passing resemblance to Robert Shaw's portrayal of Quint. Also, if you're one of the many people who enjoys unfairly mocking the rubbery appearance of Bruce, wait till you see The Last Sharks titular monster, which lifelessly bobs up and down in the water like a novelty lilo. Released theatrically in the lead up to Universal€™s very own insult to Jaws fans, 'Jaws 3-D', the makers of the film were sued for plagiarism by Universal, reuslting in the film being sucessfully blocked from release in the United States. To this day the film has yet to be legally shown on TV or released on video or DVD. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XL0QOYL2WFY&feature=player_embedded
Contributor
Contributor

Cult horror enthusiast and obsessive videogame fanatic. Stephen considers Jaws to be the single greatest film of all-time and is still pining over the demise of Sega's Dreamcast. As well regularly writing articles for WhatCulture, Stephen also contributes reviews and features to Ginx TV.