REVIEW: The Meg Will Keep You in the Water
Summer is slowly winding down and families are trying to squeeze in one last vacation before school starts. Movie studios are also squeezing in their flicks for the last of the summer’s blockbusters. Warner Bros. releases their effort, the shark movie, The Meg, this Friday, August 10. Based on the book, Meg: A Novel of Deep Terror by Steve Alten this movie won’t keep anyone out of the water like the summer shark films in years past.
The Meg follows deep sea rescue diver, Jonas Taylor (Jason Statham), who is enlisted to help the Mana One Underwater Facility Team rescue three of their divers. These divers are stranded on a research mission after being hit by a large unknown object. Spoiler-alert, the team is narrowly rescued and they soon learn the unknown object is actually a Megalodon (a shark bigger than a great white and considered to be one of the fiercest to ever live). Jonas and the team somehow are followed back to the research facility by this giant shark and it is now up to them to prevent the Meg from wreaking havoc.
Ever since Steven Spielberg released Jaws in the summer of 1975, directors have been trying to recreate that “stay out of the water” feeling. The Meg falls well short of the terror felt by audiences when they first saw the great white, Jaws, appear off Amity Island.
One of the biggest problems with The Meg is the shark itself. Nothing is realistic about the shark or its attacks. The mouth is entirely too big causing the “attacks” to lose the fear factor and the overuse of CGI takes away the feeling of being in the water. The dialogue is incredibly weak and storylines, while attempted, are left unresolved. The film introduces a number of arcs but they never go anywhere. Focusing on a few to explore would have propelled the film in a better direction and helped it immensely.
Fans looking for a scary shark movie to see this weekend, just watch Jaws again. However, if you’re looking for a movie that will make you laugh from its ridiculousness, see this one when it is released on DVD and On Demand later this year.
Grade: C-