First, A Small & Personal Point
This movie is the reason I am here. By here I mean on the internet, talking movies, polluting your browser and coming in your eyes with these half baked opinions and pointless trivia.
I am a Jaws nerd and a shark fanatic. Childhood dreams of being a marine biologist were dashed when I realised I was as academically gifted as the cast of Jersey Shore. But my fascination with toothy aquatic predators has never ended.
This fascination has stemmed from the first time I sneaked into my older brother’s room back on October 8th, 1981 to catch the first ever TV showing of a movie my parents had forbidden me, barely having started school, from watching – Jaws.
It left me terrified of the water, but that terror also gave birth to a fascination. Both with the scientific knowledge and facts behind sharks, and with Nature Gone Wrong / Animals Attack movies. In the latter category, the wetter the better!
After the lean years following the awfulness of Jaws : The Revenge, shark movies were rare. One day in 1997, I chanced upon a book- Meg: A Novel Of Deep Terror by Steve Alten- and read it from cover to cover in about two days. It’s pulp, but glorious, cinematic, enthusiastic, bombastic, gleeful, fun pulp of the highest order. The cover breathlessly declared “Soon To Be A Major Motion Picture.”
That was it. I fired up my 56k dial-up connection, hit Yahoo! and typed in “Meg Movie”. A world was revealed to me for the first time that day. I discovered Corona Coming Attractions, Ain’t It Cool News, Dark Horizons, Cinescape. Websites full of news that I, as a movie fan, had only dreamed of. Spy reports, behind the scenes pictures, a community of people as fascinated by film as I was.
So The Meg (as it is now titled) led me to all of you, in a roundabout way. This movie was in development hell the day I discovered the movie internet community and has remained so for nearly 22 years. I have followed the development of this movie closely for all this time. I can barely believe I am finally reporting that a trailer is close at hand!
Just Get On With It!
Sorry. For a moment there it was like I was writing for some other website.
The Meg features ace submersible pilot and marine biologist Jonas Taylor fighting a giant, prehistoric shark that is menacing some scientists working on a submersible platform. Taylor will be played by Jason Statham with a supporting cast that features Ruby Rose, Jessica McNamee, Lee Bingbing and Rainn Wilson.
Original author Steve Alten updated his fans via his monthly newsletter (OK, I admit it, I am on the mailing list!) to tell us all:
“I’VE ACTUALLY SEEN THE TWO TRAILERS AND THEY ARE EXCELLENT. THE POWERS-THAT-BE DECIDED IT WOULD BE BEST TO DELAY THEIR LAUNCH FROM LATE MARCH UNTIL APRIL. THE REASON HAS TO DO WITH ANALYTICS, AND IF THE VIEWING AUDIENCE SEES A TRAILER TOO EARLY AND THEN THE MOVIE COMES OUT MUCH LATER, THEY ARE LEFT WITH A FALSE IMPRESSION THAT THE MOVIE HAD ALREADY BEEN OUT.
WHAT IS IMPORTANT IS THAT THE TRAILERS ARE FINISHED AND THEY WILL COME OUT IN APRIL… ALSO DEBUTING IN APRIL WILL BE THE MOVIE POSTER. I’VE SEEN THE MOCK-UP AND REALLY LIKE IT. IT FEATURES AN ANGLE OF THE MEG THAT HAS NEVER APPEARED ON ONE OF MY MEG COVERS.”
Directed by Jon Turteltaub of National Treasure fame, The Meg is due in US cinemas on August 8th.
Read my freakishly long article about Jaws 2 here.
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