Review: The Meg

Posted on 13 September, 2018

(Imagine the following being read by the voiceover guy from the Discovery Channel – he makes everything sound epic). 

In a post-Jaws world, where there have been six Sharknado films…and Shark Week is a viewer favourite every year…do we want, do we need another shark movie?

Why not? If you’ve got a yearning for popcorn and choc tops, and life is a bit too serious at the moment, you could do worse than watch Jason Statham scowl at a megalodon for a couple of hours.

It certainly has its good points – reasonably well realised monsters and visual effects, a nicely outlandish plot, genuinely funny moments, a bit of attitude, some scares (but nothing an old lady like me couldn’t handle) and a story that gallops entertainingly along to the only conclusion this sort of film could have.

The gore factor is actually quite low – a character chomped and only his hand left behind, a mutilated mega-shark (the afore-mentioned inevitable ending) – but nothing that made me hide behind my hand. Although there are a few scenes where I had my protective palm quite close to my eyes.

It is an international creation of American and Chinese film companies, filmed in New Zealand with Aussie and Kiwi actors, Chinese, English and Taiwanese leads and sympathetic Japanese and Icelandic character roles. Not bad. The Chinese star is also a woman, a scientist and a badass. Good. So it is then disappointing that the only African American in the cast is reduced to the sort of caricature that hasn’t be acceptable on film since the 1950s.

Directed by the workmanlike John Turteltaub (National Treasure) it is what it is advertised to be – entertaining and fun. I have to say the two child actors are excellent. Sophia Cai is central to the action and, in a nice twist, has far more idea of what is going on than most adults. Her chemistry with Statham seems genuine and fun. Wei Yi, as ‘awesome kid on beach’ makes the most of his stereotype in the climactic scenes where the Meg finds his way to a resort beach. Hilarious!

There is also an impossibly cute dog, of course, but Pippin (like his human fellow stereotypes) is the product of writers and a director aware of using them as shorthand storytelling tools. They know that we expect certain things to happen to certain characters in an action film like this and they have a little fun with that.

The beach location, when seen from above, looks frighteningly like a bowl of sugary breakfast treats for the Meg to snack on – all popping colour and as crowded as a bowl of rice bubbles. One of the best set pieces in the film.

Roslyn saw this as a guest of Limelight Cinemas Tuggeranong. Feature image: facebook.com/pg/TheMegUK