The Meg Movie Review!

Howdy Peeps!

The Meg was awesome! I want to review it fully, so the first bit will be general and then I’ll warn you before the major spoilers, OK? Let’s go.

If you have ever seen any shark movie (Jaws, Deep Blue Sea, Open Water) then you pretty much know how it’ll go: People die, hero goes after shark, shark dies. There isn’t a major change to this formula but it is nicely done.

I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that a massive budget and modern special effects make this 100x more impressive than Jaws appears to the modern viewer. I said the other day that I didn’t want to see the shark or Jason Statham die, but I knew one of them had to. So while the plot was a little predictable, it was fast-paced and well-made. There is a bit in the middle (which I won’t spoil) where it could go one of several ways…they didn’t pick the most obvious, so I liked that little break from the routine.

Possibly the main reason for watching this is Jason Statham. We are huge fans of his dry wit and physical skills in both the Transporter films and the Fast & Furious franchise.  He does not disappoint. In fact, there is a lot of humour in this film, Jason is assisted in this by Rainn Wilson (who I understand is in the American version of The Office) and Page Kennedy.

The absolute star of this movie though is that little girl! She’s smart, funny and sensitive. There are also some brilliantly tense scenes that made many in the cinema jump!

A few nice little extras, aside from the comedy, are; the Chinese culture, the real-life references to science and TV documentaries and the fact that the way they found Meg could easily be used in a sequel. The use of music in the film and trailers is amusing and the graphics were beautiful.

The opening of the film is very similar to the beginning of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. It’s dark, moody and intense. (In fact, quite a lot of the film is dark- because of deep water- so that coming out of the cinema into daylight feeling is like ten-fold! I may have blinded myself by going to the loo at the wrong time! LOL) This first scene is when we get the first bit of gore (and not because of a shark bite!) and the gory bits are pretty spectacular, so if blood and guts bother you then you may wanna skip this film (to us it was gross but cool…certainly realistic).

Side note: The Director was Jon Turteltaub who directed the fabulous National Treasure films!!

All in all, it was made for entertainment. It was a well-designed and well-executed shark movie. It wasn’t trying too hard and did not take itself too seriously. If that is what you want, then it won’t disappoint.

I’m just going to discuss a few details now so **WARNING! SPOILERS AHEAD**

Having watched every trailer and theory I could before going in, I didn’t get the impression that the little girl and her mum were related to Jason Statham, but I did hear more than one YouTuber say they were his wife and kid. I’m glad they were wrong because it gave the opportunity to show how brilliant Jason Statham is with children.

The use of the Mariana Trench and it’s unfamiliarity makes this a lot more believable. It also leaves it wide open for another Megalodon to come through the same way in a sequel….or a giant squid. I was kinda disappointed at how little we saw of the squid and would like to see more.

The girl who gets injured first is Statham’s character’s ex-wife and I’m glad the plot wasn’t about them getting back together and not too much of him and the other woman getting together either…you don’t go to watch a shark movie for a romance plot!

It was great to just be an action film with a realistic amount of humour. Not Sharknado cheesy but not Open Waters intense, just good middle ground action.

The only bits I didn’t really like involved whales; there’s a sad bit with a baby whale alone and a gross/too cheesy bit when they try depth charges on the Meg and get a whale instead….put it this way, the makers did some serious research into how whale insides look. That was good in a way because it was realistic but the blown-up pieces covering the people who did it…eeeeww! (Gross and too tongue-in-cheek).

Major spoiler ahead: The ending had a somewhat poetic justice in that the carcass of the Meg was being eaten by regular sharks, so the things we feared in other movies were helping the humans in this one and it kinda acknowledges them as the real stars of the sea and this type of film…clever.

A final little nod to the humour at the end, they used ‘Fin’ instead of ‘The End’…made me smile anyway. 🙂

Good for what it was and I’d definitely take it over a lot of other shark-movies. 7.5/10

See ya later Shark fans!

Anna x

 

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