As Brody walks down
to the surf there is a cut to a shot of his wife by the soda stand further up
the beach. She spies her husband in the crowd and waves to catch his attention.
The shot is carefully composed to place Ellen between two iconic American
symbols: a Coca Cola sign on the left of the screen, and the stars and stripes
fluttering in the background on the right. Taken out of context the image could
easily be used as a piece of advertising copy. Indeed, the prominent placing of
the red Coke button was no accident, but an example of product placement. In
the earlier beach scene when Brody was watching for the shark, drinks coolers
with the Coke logo on them had been carefully placed in the background to be clearly
visible, alongside some artfully arranged cans of Tab and Fanta from the same
company. Compared to the more blatant advertising practices of modern Hollywood, the placement in Jaws was subtly done, and it could even
be argued that the colour – like that of the hapless estuary victim’s rowboat –
contributes to the foreshadowing of the bloody stain that will spread on the
surface of the pond. Other real-life products were also featured in the movie:
on board the Orca Brody masks the
smell of the chum bucket with Old Spice aftershave, and in his demonstration of
machismo Quint crushes a Narragansett
beer can.
