Unless you have been living under a rock or had your head in the clouds for the past few weeks you will be fully cognisant with Jason Statham’s (The Transporter Trilogy) man versus megashark summer flick, thanks to Warner Bros.' relentless ad campaign, which is clearly aimed at the family trade. If you are one of the lucky ones that managed to dodge the shark bait, here’s a quick brief on the shameless popcorn B-movie outing.

 

'The Meg' is based on a book by Steve Alten (Meg: A Novel of Deep Terror) and follows the underwater escapades of a Navy deep-sea diver, Jonas Taylor. The film 'The Meg', set to hit screens this very weekend, is yet another English/Chinese co-production that features an international cast led by Statham as the courageous Taylor, who attempts to save a group of scientists, among them Dr. Heller, played by Australian actor Robert Taylor (The Matrix), from a massive underwater shark attack.

 

'The Meg', a flimsily-handled 'Frankenshark' sci-fi horror adventure has been vastly scaled back for the PG13 summer vacation audience and fails to achieve any real level of threat due to the neutered nature of the beast. It is directed by Jon Turteltaub (National Treasure), who once again goes right back to the template he roughly used with 'National Treasure', bombarding the audience with cringe-inducing implausibilities and unbelievable plot devices, while pandering unsurprisingly to every killer shark cliché ever to grace the big screen, floating (bloodless) arm included.