The Mariana Trench
When I first learned that Jason Statham would be portraying Dr. Jonas Tyler, a marine biologist and paleontologist, in an adaptation of MEG: A Novel of Deep Terror by Steve Alten, I visually winced. While I personally have nothing against Statham, I’ve never seen him as more than a standard action flick guy. I found it hard to believe that Statham could pull off the role of a brilliant scientist/adventurer and immediately felt that The MEG was deep sixed before it could even set sail.
Thankfully the Jonas Tyler in the film is nothing like the Dr. Jonas Tyler from the book series. On the screen, Jonas Tyler is a deep sea rescue diver, and Statham is more than capable of pulling this type of role off without any problems. Tyler’s profession was just one of many differences between the book and the film, but it somehow worked just fine. If you’ve read the book (the first of a really fun series), you won’t leave the theater believing that your beloved novel of deep terror has been ripped to shreds. Nope, the film is so different that it’s almost like seeing an alternate universe version of the story.
I won’t go into detail about the differences, but I will give a brief summary of the plot. I promise not to spoil anything, so read on with confidence.
The movie opens in a similar fashion (minus the dinosaur lunch crunch) where Tyler loses friends in a submarine accident while rescuing sailors from a nuclear submarine. Just like in the book, Tyler isn’t believed when he tells everyone that something attacked the submarine and caused the death of his friends. The movie jumps ahead five years and billionaire Jack Morris (Rainn Wilson) has just arrived on Mana One, a research facility that he funds that is attempting to prove that the Mariana Trench is much deeper than is believed.
A team is sent down to find out if the trench really is deeper and, yep, it is, and it’s hiding a very big, very hungry secret. The team is trapped in the trench after being attacked by the very same something that attacked Tyler’s rescue team five years prior. Stranded, the crew of Mana One reach out to Jonas Tyler and ask him to save their stranded crew which happens to include his ex-wife, Lori (Jessica McNamee).
Tyler arrives on the scene and manages to rescue the crew with some difficulties that I won’t go into, but as the team resurfaces, they are unknowingly followed by a megalodon. From there, it becomes a battle of man versus beast as the Mana One crew and Tyler attempt to stop the Meg before it kills everything and everyone in its path.
Pros:
The film has an excellent pace to it thanks to the direction of Jon Turteltaub (Cool Runnings, Phenomenon, National Treasure, While You Were Sleeping) and the screenplay penned by Dean Georgaris, and Jon and Erich Hoeber. The story is rather simple: A prehistoric shark escapes the deepest, darkest portion of the sea and goes on a killing rampage while a resourceful and intelligent group of humans try to stop it. Somehow, Turteltaub and company manage to hold your attention while this simple story plays out. Not once did I check my watch during the film, and that’s a huge indicator that I am really enjoying what I am watching.
That aforementioned resourceful and intelligent group is one of the other reasons that this supposed B-movie is a grade above standard shark films. Most killer shark films feature a ton of inept and completely brainless humans that do stupid things that ends up in them either being eaten or being saved by the heroic lead. In this film, Statham does most of the physical work but he relies on the intelligence of the rest of the group to make things happen. Characters like Mac (Cliff Curtis, who deserves to be a bigger star by now in my opinion), Suyin Zhang (Li Bingbing), Jaxx (Ruby Rose) and The Wall (Olafur Darri Olaffson), all play key roles in the film. Some of their contributions might seem minor, but they are needed and Tyler relies on them throughout the movie until the big climax where Statham goes into full hero mode.
There’s also a perfect amount of humor littered throughout film. DJ (Page Kennedy), The Wall, and Morris provided just enough humor to keep the film light enough to keep watching. There are also a few humorous scenes involving beachgoers and a cute little dog named Pippin that lighten the frantic mood of the film.
Another positive thing about this movie is that the precocious little youngster that’s usually the most annoying person in a shark film is actually one of the best parts of The MEG. Shuya Sophia Cai is adorable as Meiying, Zhang’s daughter in the film. She’s one of the few people in the movie that manages to stay out of trouble for the most part, and she injects some humor into the film as well.
The special effects in a film like this will often be the major determining factor of whether or not a film is B grade or a step above. The film’s special effects crew did a brilliant job of making the megalodon and all of the other CGI creatures in the film look believable. They also did a great job with the gliders used during some of the action sequences. Even in a few of the campier moments in the movie, the shark and the action looked good.
The film also did a great job of generating suspense. Much of the action takes place underwater, and the audience often got a glimpse of it from the actors’ points of view. In one particular scene, Zhang is looking frantically around her trying to find the megalodon. The camera swoops back and forth for the audience until the payoff (which I won’t mention here), resulting in tension and a big “jump” scare for the crowd. There are a few “jump at you” scares in the film, but they aren’t overdone or as forced as they seem to be in similar films.
Cons
I really don’t have that many complaints about this film. It’s far from perfect, but it’s good enough that I’ll let a lot of the negatives slide. For example, DJ could have simply been written as the comic relief (and he is for the most part), but he has moments of brilliance that make him just a little bit better than the standard comic relief in a film like this. The shark is a little bit faster or a little bit slower when need be, but I caught myself pulling my legs up knowing full well that the person the MEG was chasing was going to survive.
Could the acting have been better? Sure. Could the music have been better? Maybe. The bottom line is that I don’t care about these types of things whenever a movie knows exactly what it is (a big popcorn flick) and plays to that demographic in spades, but also strives to be something better than a cheesy creature flick and it works most of the time.
The MEG will not win any awards. It won’t go down in history as the greatest shark movie ever made (but at its current pace, it might just end up being the second most financially successful shark film behind Jaws). It will eventually become one of those films that gets played and replayed a million times on TBS or FX. Some of the cast will go on to bigger things (like the lovely Ruby Rose, who’s already lined up to play Batwoman in the Arrowverse and in a potential series) and others will probably fade away from memory. Jason Statham will probably get a call back for a sequel or two (although fans of the book will be left scratching their heads wondering how that can be), and each sequel will probably be worse than the one before…..
But…..
Let’s relish in the fact that The MEG has already beaten the estimates set for its opening and second weekend. Let’s enjoy watching the snarky professional critics wring their hands and gnash their teeth in misery as the film they trashed continues to succeed for reasons that they can’t understand. Let’s let the big shark be the big shark and eat all of its competition.
In short, enjoy this film as much as it enjoys being itself.
Thanks for reading this post. The MEG is far from perfect, but it’s intelligently campy fun that has action, humor, suspense, and a whole lotta shark. Go see it.
Ken's Alternate Universe! 