A British cage diver has captured a terrifying image of a great white shark heading for the surface - just like the famous poster for Jaws.

The 17ft predator, caught on camera off the west coast of Mexico, shows off its menacing set of jagged teeth as it swims overhead in the photo.

The image has a striking resemblance to the poster used for Steven Spielberg's 1975 horror classic, which shows a shark rocketing from the deep towards an unsuspecting female swimmer.

Fortunately, unlike Roger Kastel's poster, there were no swimmers in sight when British photographer and filmmaker Euan Rannachan captured the picture.

A British cage diver has captured a terrifying image of a great white shark heading for the surface (left) - just like the famous poster for Jaws (right)

The 17ft predator, caught on camera off the west coast of Mexico, bares its teeth as it swims overhead in the photo

The 32-year-old was in a cage just a few feet away from the huge predator when he captured the image.

'The shark in my image is a female and her name is Squirrel. We'd been with her for a while. We have these people on the boat called shark wranglers and they throw these two-foot chunks of tuna to get the shark close to the surface', said the young photographer.

'The shark wrangles played an important and dangerous part on the acquisition of this amazing picture.

'A guy named Crazy Luis stood up on the boat to bring the shark to us when we sit on the surface in the shark cage', said Euan.

Fortunately, unlike Roger Kastel's poster, there were no swimmers in sight when British photographer and filmmaker Euan Rannachan captured his pictures

The 32-year-old Briton was in a cage just a few feet away from the huge predator when he captured the images

Euan Rannachan is shown trying to line up the perfect picture of the shark, named Squirrel

Roy Scheider plays Police Chief Martin Brody in the 1975 original movie 'Jaws'. He will come face to face with the killer beast that is terrorising the coast of a placid tourist New England town

'Sometimes when the wranglers play with the sharks, the sharks get p****d off and dive down under the boat and the bait so they can come rocketing up and get it.

'That's exactly what Squirrel was doing here, she was fed up probably messing around on the surface and dived back down under the boat. It was really deep there but the water clarity was amazing', said the 32-year-old about his shark experience.

The movie filmed by Spielberg in 1975 tells the story of the Police Chief Martin Brody, played by Roy Scheider, in Amity Island where a young woman has been killed by a shark while skinny-dipping near the New England tourist town.

An ichthyologist, Matt Hooper (Richard Dreyfuss), and a ship captain, Quint (Robert Shaw), offer to help Brody capture the killer beast, and the trio engage in an epic battle of man vs. nature.