Our movie guy, John McCann, says ‘The Meg’ is an awful mess of a movie…

With low expectations, but high anticipation of a brain-vacation movie forthcoming, I took my comfy seat at Tralee Omniplex ready to marvel at the wonderful world of CGI effects, shriek at the horror of 70ft Megaladon shark, and chuckle along with Jason Statham’s corny lines.

Not that a plot is overly important in a movie such as this, ‘The Meg’ tells the tale of a deep-sea submersible which has been attacked by a massive creature, previously thought to be extinct, and now lies disabled at the bottom of the deepest trench in the Pacific…with its crew trapped inside.

Continued below…

With time running out, expert deep sea rescue diver Jonas Taylor (Jason Statham) is recruited to save the crew -and the ocean itself – from this unstoppable threat: a pre-historic 75-foot-long shark known as the Megalodon.

From the very first scene of this tongue in cheek B movie, it’s quite obvious that anything resembling acting or indeed script writing were not considered when putting this feature together.

I accept that extra helpings of cheese are a staple part of the B movie diet but the some of the dialogue in this film were so full of fromage that they nearly rendered me lactose intolerant with each line more cringe worthy than the last.

As for the actors on show, the performances were so bland that the Stath shone like a beacon in this underwater bed of insipidity and you would imagine that the biggest thing about this feature was the cheque that made him agree to take part!

The visual effects of this big budget blockbuster should have made up for the rest of this movies shortcomings but alas by the end of the near two hour running time, I was simply exhausted at the at times flaky CGI and was yearning for the exit door long before the final scene.

If I have to find crumbs of comfort and give credit for this mess it would be firstly to those in the editing department that managed via the endless trailers to convince me (and countless others no less) that this may be a blockbuster worth catching and secondly to Jason Statham whose performance is De Niro like in comparison to his acting companions and you do feel that with a proper script and director he may find a feature that showcases his talents.

Overall, the Meg is one strictly for fans of the straight to home release B movie which fails to rise above the depths of mediocrity in which it so willingly sinks to throughout!

1/5

• For more of John McCann’s movie reviews, check out his Facebook page here and website here