Spielberg tells of guilt over harm hit film Jaws may have done to sharks

Director tells BBC's Desert Island Discs he regrets the frenzy of sport fishing' that followed 1975 thriller's release

All it takes to conjure an instant sense of danger in anyone who has watched Jaws is two notes, a semitone apart, ingeniously deployed to indicate the impending threat of a great white shark.

But now, nearly half a century on, director Steven Spielberg has conceded that perhaps the Oscar-winning 1975 thriller was too effective at conjuring fear of the defamed creatures, admitting he is truly regretful" for any influence he has had on the world's rapidly shrinking shark population.