What is it with the shark movie that we find so fascinating? Ever since the quintessential Jaws in 1975, no animal has ever been so demonized by film media as the shark. Maybe it's the fact that in American culture, we value the grandiose. Perhaps the shark speaks to the paranoia and fear that maybe we truly are not in control of the entire world and that there are forces of nature that are superior to our humanity. As films carry on, the sharks get bigger and more advanced. Whether it be the technologically smart shark in Deep Blue Sea (1998) or the roaring shark our for blood revenge in Jaws: The Revenge, filmmakers have tried to find ways to make these creatures of deep more and more intimidating. (I shit you not, the shark actually roars in Jaws: The Revenge) The Meg attempts to this in the most grandiose fashion to date.
After being stuck in development hell since 1997, The Meg finally got made. The film follows a crew of deep-sea scientists who accidentally unleash a 75-foot Megalodon thought to be extinct back into the world. The film also follows PTSD stricken diver Jonas Taylor (Jason Statham) as he attempts to get back into the water at possibly the worst time possible. The film got its big time of an estimated 178 billion dollars (not including an estimated 148 million spent on advertising) that it sought for years. This is in part to being co-financed by Chinese investors Gravity Media. In case you weren't aware, China now has more movie screens than the United States. Not only that, they add approximately 27 screens a day. Film investors have started to pay attention to this and made many more movies accessible to the massive market that is the Chinese box office. See my review for Kong: Skull Island if you want another example This film is the biggest collaboration to date between American and Chinese film production companies and was actually engineered for success in China. The Chinese love the stereotypical America action movie. they love the spectacle of explosions, women, the adrenaline. This is why visuals are being more valued in large tent-pole blockbusters rather than dialogue, which is a true defeat for good filmmaking. The Meg hits this formula perfectly, filled with shaky dialogue at times and chock-full of a CGI based shark. The film also features a romantic tension between Statham and Chinese star Bingbing Li, demonstrating a perfect marriage of American and Chinese culture and serves as a higher allegory for the final production. So, enough on the production history, let's actually review the film.
The Meg really struggles to find a tone. Despite the grossly laughably fictional content it deals with, the film starts out with a grave and dire tone. Death of people is met with severe consequence and start is filled with fear and paranoia. It goes for the Hitchcockian tone that made Jaws a masterpiece, by not showing the shark for the first act of the film yet doesn't quite accomplish it. Once the film embraces the Sharknadoesque ridiculousness of the plot, it really becomes a fun movie. For Christ's sake, the movie is about a big shark terrorizing the world. It really is fun to see Statham in another movie where he plays the same character. He has perfected the perfect B-action movie star role. Rainn Wilson and Page Kennedy shine as the comic relief of the film. The plot honestly had some twists and turns that weren't expected for me as a viewer. The jump scares were about what I expected, and the action scenes were enjoyable. I wish the film didn't make the conscious decision for a poorly executed romantic subplot, but that's not possible in most action films. I wish the film was allowed to be bloodier and far more gruesome, but I understand that with budgetary concerns comes an automatic PG-13 requirement to reach the maximum audience accessibility.
Overall, the film was about half-good. When it allowed itself to be self-aware and silly, it was the campy B-movie that I wanted to pass the time to. When it attempted to be serious, it was absolutely laughable. Maybe it's the nostalgia in me, but it could've been a lot worse. The shark didn't roar. Seriously Jaws: The Revenge?
Grade; (5.5/10)
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