While many people may believe that a person can achieve overnight success, what they fail to remember is the fact that before they do accomplish it, they put their heart and soul into their work. And when it comes to the film industry, then Steven Spielberg is one of the most acclaimed filmmakers that make creating a blockbuster look easy.
But just like the story of an overnight success, most people don’t know just how far he has gone to make every single shot look near perfect. But this in turn, also caused problems on more than one occasion, the most infamous being in one of the most iconic films in history that almost drowned the cast and crew of his film, after which, he didn’t try to attempt even a similar scene like that ever again.
Steven Spielberg Removed A Scene In Jurassic Park Because of Jaws
When it comes to being the mind behind some of the most memorable and iconic films in the history of cinema, none can come close to the genius of director Steven Spielberg. The way every single film he created had become a success is nothing short of exemplary, but many people may not know the struggle that the director went through to make it happen. One of the most infamous cases that had been recorded was when the director was creating the iconic Jaws, and the cast and crew almost lost their lives during a scene.
You may also like: “I had been playing with Fire”: Steven Spielberg Risked Everything for His $322M Movie That Took 10 Years That Included Rejecting Close Friend Harrison Ford
During the shooting, the ship was named Orca, and was the ship that was used as the main vessel in the film that was used to being pulled by speedboats since it was a prop vessel. With a stroke of bad luck, the speedboat one day pulled the ship a little too fast, which resulted in the hull of the ship coming off. This further resulted in water starting to enter the boat in a rapid manner and it began to sink.
Speilberg saw in horror as the cast and crew were flailing and crying out for lifeboats to be deployed and sent their way which resulted in every one of them being saved. This was one of the biggest incidents that happened on the sets of the Oscar-winning film, and later, when it was time to shoot a similar scene in 1993’s Jurassic Park, he decided to scrap the whole sequence to not meet the same fate, or worse.
You may also like: ‘Jaws’ Actress Could Have Been Badly Hurt Without Steven Spielberg as 10 Crew Members Were Pulling Him From Both Sides to Create Shark Attack Scene
What Was The Scene That Steven Spielberg Had To Remove From Jurassic Park?
After almost 20 years of making his iconic marine horror film, the Ready Player One director was making Jurassic Park, where another scene came up involving a boat and a carnivorous dinosaur chasing it. The scene would’ve involved Grant, Lex, and Tim sneaking past a sleeping T. Rex and managing to acquire and inflate a nearby life raft and set sail on the river, but Lex decides to scream at the dinosaur to taunt him. The T.Rex wakes up and gives them chase in the river, but its path is blocked by a wall of trees before it could devour them.
While this was the planned shot, the director instantly called it off. David Koepp, the co-writer of the film recalled the incident, saying:
“[Spielberg] like thumbed past [the river] and went, ‘Nah,’ we’re not gonna do this one.’ So it was cut very early on. I think the idea of combining– there was so much that was gonna be challenging and difficult and had yet to be figured out technologically on that movie, that the idea of adding water to that made Mr. Jaws, you know… ‘This is gonna be hard enough, I don’t think I’ll do that.'”
While he may have removed a very exhilarating and scary scene from the film, the end result was still as wonderful and fulfilling as people could’ve asked for.
You may also like: “I began to laugh”: Steven Spielberg Thought John Williams Pranked Him After First Hearing the Iconic Jaws Theme Only To Admit His Mistake Later
Jaws, available on Apple TV.
Source: ReelBlend Podcast
