The Meg | Review

Tonight, She Chums: Turteltaub Unleashes Somnambulistic Creature Feature

Fans of Deep Blue Sea or one of the various Jaws sequels may have their pleasure sensors tripped by the likes of The Meg, a high-profile studio effort about a prehistoric Megalodon shark who rises from her oceanic depths to reign terror on a densely populated resort beach off the coast of China. Delivering large doses of heavy-handed comedic asides in place of any character development or scientific research, it’s hard to imagine what kept interest alive in this project which has been floating in and out of developmental hell since the 1990s, when Steve Alten’s novel Meg (1997) originally caught Hollywood’s interest as a next generation riff on Spielberg’s seminal inception of event cinema (and if this takes off, there are six written sequels to the original novel).

At one recent point attracting the likes of Eli Roth as one of its many potential helmers, honors eventually went to Jon Turteltaub, a mainstream director who has heretofore focused on light-fared, audience friendly fluff (his last dip into genre was 1999’s risible Instinct), who unveils this narrative as gracefully as its titular man-eater mangles a handful of victims.

Several years after surviving an encounter with what he was convinced was a 70-foot shark, Jonas Taylor (Jason Statham) is jostled out of retirement to help retrieve a research sub stuck at the bottom of the lowest part of the Pacific Ocean—which happens to be manned by his ex-wife, Lori (Jessica McNamee). Having crept into the reservoir which had kept the Megalodon in its specific ecosystem, the human presence allows for a Megalodon, a giant prehistoric shark, to rise out of her lair and henceforth terrorize the nearest vacation beach in China she can find. After successfully rescuing all but one of the crew members from the trapped submarine, Jonas finds himself in charge of an elite group run by Dr. Zhang (Winston Chao) and his oceanographer daughter Suyin (Li Bingbing) who attempt to detain the shark by any means necessary. Unfortunately, they are undermined by their billionaire financier, Morris (Rainn Wilson).

A bizarre assembly of international supporting characters, many whose areas of expertise aren’t really divulged successfully, makes The Meg seem like something its studio assumed would perform better at the overseas box-office rather than back home, considering the Chinese market’s fervor for American stars. However, the woefully miscast Statham seems an odd choice for several reasons (including his Ellen Ripley-esque backstory), thrust into a brawn vs. brains archetype which used to proliferate many a masc man led franchise (Stallone, Schwarzenegger, Van Damme) but here seems painfully silly.

As entertaining as it is to watch his uncomfortable shared romance with a game Li Bingbing, somehow the use of her child as the go-between who procures men attracted to her mother is as tone deaf as every other aspect of a narrative which is all catch and release sans an ounce of logic to support what’s going on or why. But they both fare better than some awkward supporting characters barley eked out by a puffy Rainn Wilson, (here blowing through every stereotype possible for a tacky, billionaire elitist), Ruby Rose as a gel-haired lead engineer whose queerness seems to have been edited out of the dialogue, and Page Kennedy as the resident black man, who (yeah, you guessed it) can’t swim.

With a running time of nearly two hours, this regressive throwback is a nod to the prehistoric storytelling techniques Hollywood apparently still hasn’t extricated itself from. But if you want to see giant CGI sharks photographed by Clint Eastwood’s prized DP Tom Stern, maybe it’s best to just watch The Meg on mute.

★/☆☆☆☆☆