The Meg – Film Review
Ever since the release of Steven Spielberg’s 1975 horror classic Jaws, there has been dozens of imitations. Jon Turteltaub’s The Meg is the best shark film since then.
Jonas Taylor (Jason Statham) and a group of scientists come face-to-face with an extremely dangerous and large megalodon shark. Now, he must do whatever he takes in order to save a large group of people from being killed by the shark.
The Meg is a film that knows that it is cheesy, and that is perhaps one of the film’s greatest strengths. Instead of trying to be an extraordinarily serious epic, it embraces its cheesy plot and setup which leads to funny moments and plenty of fun.
The acting is also decent for the most part, especially by Statham. His character is exceptionally likeable and I did root for him throughout the entire running time of The Meg.
Rainn Wilson as Jack Morris in The Meg (2018)
Tom Stern shot this film and he did a fairly good job with that aspect of the film. Everything looks good for the most part which added to the overall experience of the film. The film’s score by Harry-Gregson Williams was also great and had an excellent eerie vibe.
The film does suffer from a slow pace, unfortunately. This film could have easily had time to further develop its characters, story, and world, but it never does. Many scenes went by and felt extremely slow, and left me wanting more Statham versus megalodon action.
Another issue is that even though I appreciated the film embracing its corny tone and story, I did end up finding multiple scenes hard to enjoy and take seriously because they were absolutely ridiculous.
There is nothing really remarkable about The Meg either. Yes, it is a fun film in which we get to see Statham try to stop a giant shark, but also, when you leave the theatre, you will just end up wanting more.
It also could have benefited from an R rating as well. We do get to see some visually entertaining shark scenes, but the film never completely commits to that. Having an R rating would have made the film more believable, as we could have seen a lot more blood than we got in the actual film.
The Meg has plenty of fun and comedic scenes, but suffers from a slow pace and can be hard to enjoy at times due to its silly story.
Overall Grade: C+
MPAA Rating: Rated PG-13 for action/peril, bloody images, and some language
Cast: Jason Statham, Li Bingbing, Rainn Wilson, Ruby Rose
Directed by: Jon Turteltaub
Distributed by: Warner Bros. Pictures
Running Time: 113 minutes