Posted on 05/12/2024 1:02:33 PM PDT by Morgana
Actress and stuntwoman Susan Backlinie, perhaps best known as the first shark attack victim in 'Jaws,' has died.
Backlinie, 77, died at her home in Ventura, California, her booking agent Matthew Templeton confirmed. No cause of death has been determined.
In addition to her career on the silver screen, Backlinie was a nationally ranked swimmer and professional diver.
Before she was brought onto 'Jaws' at 28 years old, she had worked as an animal trainer and performed as a mermaid.
She played Chrissie Watkins in Steven Spielberg's iconic 1975 film and spent three days rehearsing the opening scene, in which she is thrashed around by a great white before vanishing beneath the waves.
She later appeared in Spielberg's '1941' to parody the scene that launched her into stardom. This time, instead of being eaten by a shark, she is picked up by a Japanese submarine.
Some of her other credits include 'Two-Minute Warning,' The Great Muppet Caper,' 'Day of the Animals' and the television series 'The Fall Guy.'
'It is with heartfelt regret to confirm our beloved Susan passed away this morning,' Templeton said in a statement to The Daily Jaws, a fan site dedicated to the film.
'We would like to thank everyone for their condolences at this time. Please respect the family’s privacy during this difficult time.'
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
RIP Susan Backlinie
I loved the parody scene in “1941”. Horrywood
Day of the Animals was a good 70’s tv movie.
Did she die again in Jaws 2, the sequel.
It was such a loud screaming production that Spielberg had to fire a shotgun into the air when he needed to yell "cut".
Ping
Horrywood
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Best and funniest scene in the movie.Probably couldn’t be made today.
Having read the novel a year before the film came out, I knew that the first chomp on Chrissy took her leg cleanly off at the knee. Her performance, with my mind filling in the unseen with what Benchley gruesomely described, made the scene even horrifying to me. She did a great a job.
That movie Jaws freaked me out so damn much when I saw it in 1975. I was around 14 and use to go to the beach all the time and swim way out from shore. After that movie I wouldn’t go deeper than my waist and still to this day won’t especially after seeing that Russian get eaten
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAPpVNund0U&rco=1&ab_channel=TransParentMusicCo
It occured to me when he’s trying to swim away why we don’t see him arms. Because he doesn’t have any. Swim out? NO WAY! EVer!
“Candygram.”
Can’t decide if I like that movie or not.
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I quite liked it. But my liking the movie is probably colored by the fact that my small town was moving into the 20th century and we just got cable. Wow, no more 3 fuzzy channels and was excited by the fact I could watch fairly recent movies on my huge 25” self built Heathkit TV. That and Alien were two of the first movies shown on Showtime that I watched. This was before the big boom in VCRs.
Wow, that’s when SNL was actually funny. I saw the National Lampoon’s play Lemmings with Chevy Chase and Belushi and can’t remember if there were any more SNL players in it or not.
That takes me back, my Dad spent about 2 years building his Heathkit TV.
[cause of death has been determined.]
Linked source (now) says fatal heart attack.
Japanese Submarine Captain: where Horrywood?
Slim Pickens: right here, Hollis P. Wood
Absolutely love that movie
“Jaws star Susan Backlinie dies aged 77:”
No disrespect to Ms Backinie but she was in the movie for 5 minutes. She was not the “star”.
This was no boating accident!
Wasn’t the shark the star?
Japanese soldier: [trying to squeeze a large radio into the sub] We’ve got to figure out how to make these things smaller!
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