The shark in the music

Abstract

This article proposes a new understanding of dramatic scoring by revisiting the sequence of the notorious first shark attack in the horror film Jaws (1975). The success of the sequence, it is argued, turns on a bold and sophisticated use of preparatory material in the minutes preceding the attack. It is also suggested that, during the attack proper, it is the role of memory and the limits of attention that underpin the viewer-auditor's response to John Williams's famous motive. Drawing on the work of Richard Wollheim on the phenomenology of painting, it is proposed that the spectator 'hears-in' the music, and to buttress this central claim various articulations of the notion of 'hearing-in' are offered in the course of the discussion. The article ends with a rebuttal of the idea that music is heard unconsciously or subliminally. © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.