Movie · 2018 · Action, Science Fiction, Horror · 1h 53m · PG-13 · English
Curator score: 0.7/10 (727.6K ratings)
Pleased to eat you.
Overview
A deep sea submersible pilot revisits his past fears in the Mariana Trench, and accidentally unleashes the seventy foot ancestor of the Great White Shark believed to be extinct.
Ratings
Curator score: 0.7/10
IMDb: 5.7/10
Letterboxd: 2.44/5
Rotten Tomatoes: 47%
Metacritic: 46
TMDB: 6.2/10
Director
Jon Turteltaub
Production
Apelles Entertainment, Gravity Pictures, di Bonaventura Pictures, Flagship Entertainment Group, Maeday Productions, Warner Bros. Pictures
Cast
Jason Statham, Li Bingbing, Rainn Wilson, Cliff Curtis, Ruby Rose, Jessica McNamee, Masi Oka, Winston Chao, Shuya Sophia Cai, Page Kennedy, Robert Taylor, Ólafur Darri Ólafsson, Mai Hongmei, Wei Yi, Vithaya Pansringarm, Rob Kipa-Williams, Tawanda Manyimo, Mark Trotter, James Gaylyn, Andrew Grainger
Curator Review
Verdict
A knowingly ridiculous creature feature that mostly works as a slick, crowd-pleasing B-movie with blockbuster polish. It’s best when it leans into the absurdity of a giant shark movie and least effective when it pauses for generic human drama.
Best for
fans of big-budget monster movies
viewers who want dumb fun with decent spectacle
people who enjoy self-aware action-horror
audiences looking for a light, fast-paced summer movie
Skip if
you want serious horror or suspense
you need strong character writing
giant-creature premises sound silly to you
you dislike glossy studio action with a cartoonish edge
Overview
The Meg is exactly the kind of movie its premise promises: a giant shark, a lot of screaming, and a steady stream of people getting eaten in increasingly expensive-looking ways. It has enough momentum, scale, and shamelessness to keep the ride moving, and it understands that the joke is the attraction without turning into a full parody.
Worth noting
Jason Statham gives the movie a blunt, sturdy center, which helps sell the nonsense when the script starts drifting into standard disaster-movie beats. The supporting cast is serviceable, but the real appeal is the creature spectacle and the film’s willingness to treat a prehistoric apex predator like an event-level threat.
Bottom line
It’s not especially scary, and the human drama is thin, but it’s often more entertaining than it has any right to be. If you’re in the mood for polished trash with a big budget and a straight face, it delivers.
Top Letterboxd reviews
Alex IHE (2★) · 4293 likes
I burst into tears once the film ends on “Fin”
Basically a 150 million dollar syfy movie.
Sydney🚀 (3★) · 3579 likes
If this is trash call me a fucking raccoon
Lucy (3★) · 2346 likes
“that thing is the devil!”
an extra half star because my friends were scared to death and jumping out of their seats every time the biggest shark in known existence somehow snuck up on everyone without being noticed. which happened a lot. she’s sneaky