Last week I admitted that I saw (and dug) The Last Starfighter before I saw Star Wars. Well, this week I admit that I saw (and dug) Orca before I saw Jaws. The story is that killer whales, widely known to be some of the most peaceful marine creatures, really are killers, even if honorable ones. Maybe not a matter of honor, but it’s certainly a matter of vengeance for the movie’s remarkably intelligent and resourceful orca, which is devastated after its pregnant mate gets the harpoon treatment from some old-salt hunter (Richard Harris). The captain gets the death’s eye from the whale, and pretty soon boats are being mysteriously sunk and parts of the coastal town are being torn down. It’s as if the orca is calling its mate’s killer out to square things out, and Harris, cheerful overactor that he is, takes the bait. (He even yells back to the sea: “You want revenge? Well, you’ll have it! I’ll come out and fight you! You revengeful sumbitch!”) Jaws is by far the greater movie; if anything, this 1977 thriller from director Michael Anderson is closer to Jaws: The Revenge, with its hilariously smart shark. Still, Orca is so ridiculous in its intensity that it gives most movie versions of Moby Dick a run for their money. People laugh at it now, but this totally freaked me out as a kid. I mean, Bo Derek having her gams chewed? And the less said about the infamous orca-fetus bit the better. It’s not “campy” at all, but a solid Nature-strikes-back entry in a decade full of them.