HUNGER

Stars Chutimon Chuengcharoensukying, Nopachai Jayanama and Gunn Svasti Na Ayudhya
Writer: Kongdej Jaturanrasamee
Director: Sitisiri Mongkolsiri

Rating: ★ ★ ★ ½

The Hunger of the title is a double-edged kitchen knife in director Sitisiri Mongkolsiri’s cutting, often bittersweet piece of high society takedown. Set in the ostentatious world of ultra artistic fine dining, Hunger speaks of the craving in us all to consume food prepared in a way far more elegantly than being easily digestible requires. This is food as art, and art that carries with it all the emotions, anxieties and eccentricities of the artist.

Hunger is also about craving a status above the social standing into which you are born, an existence that demands thin slivers of your soul be trimmed away to climb above those just like to secure a place amongst the wealthy but grotesquely compromised humans that appear to you to be better…somehow.

Chutimon Chuengcharoensukying plays Aoy, a talented young street chef at her family’s Thai noodle cafe. She discovers what she didn’t know she wanted when a scout for an elite food prep outfit slips her a card emboldened with the word ‘Hunger’. It’s a ticket to the world of Chef Paul’s kitchen; Paul, played with a fierce intensity by Nopachai Chaiyanam, likes her street-food touch, and starts breaking her down so he can build her up in his image (like JK Simmons did to Miles Teller in Whiplash).

Soon, Aoy is letting the family values upon which she was raised slide and the allure of attaining a certain type of ‘special’ social place is taking hold. Paul has long slipped into the amoral world of corruption, wearing the arrogance of existing above the law like a badge. Hunger spirals with an increasing unease towards one of two potential endings - a huge fall from grace, or a moralistic realisation to be careful what you wish for.

Hunger feels a bit overlong, but that only raises the question of what to omit, and that is not easy to answer. It plays equally convincingly as both a large-scale takedown of the vacuous, soulless upper class Bangkok society types, or as a more intimate character duel between Aoy and Paul, with her very humanity at stake. And, of course, it is an absolute feast for food lovers, whether you prefer the noodle cafe nosh or the food-as-art high dining plates.

AVARICE

Stars: Gillian Alexy, Luke Ford, Nick Atkinson, Ryan Panizza, Alexandra Nell, Alexander Fleri, Tom O’Sullivan, Campbell Greenock, Priscilla-Anne Jacob and Téa Heathcote-Marks.
Writers: Adam Enslow , Dane Millerd, Andrew Slattery and John V. Soto.
Director: John V. Soto

Rating: ★ ★ ★

A rocky marriage finds some stabilising shared goals when faced with a brutal home invasion plot in John V. Soto’s slick, enjoyably compelling action/thriller, Avarice. The latest punchy piece of exportable genre entertainment from the Perth-based director delivers on the promise of his pics to date (The Gateway, 2018; The Reckoning, 2014; Needle, 2010); films that don’t reinvent the wheel but that do spin it with skill and energy.

A terrific Gillian Alexy stars as Kate, a top-tier archer with eyes on competition glory but who is also struggling to keep her marriage together. Similarly work focussed, her partner Ash (Luke Ford) is finding himself increasingly sidelined as Kate focusses on athletic goals, a disconnect that teen daughter Sarah (Téa Heathcote-Marks) is beginning to rebel against. Husband and wife decide that a weekend in their upmarket bushland retreat will perhaps positively refocus the family dynamic.

That begins to seem unlikely as a group of elite mercenaries seize control of the home with eyes on Ash’s hefty bank balance. Developments get very Die Hard-y, with Ash umming-and-ahhing about the codes that will complete the transfer, while Kate dons her trusty bow-and-arrow and begins whittling down the invader’s numbers. There are further twists in the narrative’s third act that will placate fans of the single-setting thriller, with Soto also channelling such influences as David Fincher’s Panic Room (2002) and Luis Mandoki’s underseen thriller Trapped (2002), with Charlize Theron.

The bad guys/girl ensemble are an attractively mean-spirited bunch, with Alexandra Nell and Ryan Panizza in particular upping the stakes through their snarling menace alone. Web nerds may get a bit giggly over the apparent ease with which a multi-million dollar account is accessed, but it isn't the first thriller to cut tech corners. The moments that Soto and his pro team of contributors make work - solid character acting, pacy action moments and arrow-on-antagonist payback - make Avarice another mid-budget milestone for the filmmaker.

POKER FACE

Stars: Russell Crowe, Liam Hemsworth, RZA, Brooke Satchwell, Aden Young, Steve Bastoni, Daniel McPherson, Paul Tassone, Elsa Pataky, Jack Thompson, Matt Nable, Benedict Hardie and Molly Grace.
Writer: Russell Crowe; based upon a story and original screenplay by Stephen M. Coates.
Director: Russell Crowe

Rating: ★ ½

A national treasure, of course (whether that nation be Australia or New Zealand, who knows) but it’s been quite a while since Russell Crowe has been the central creative force behind a half-decent film. 

He has done giggly cameos in Thor: Love and Thunder, The Greatest Beer Run Ever and The Mummy, had some villainous fun chewing all the scenery in Unhinged and, was fine in a well-written support part in Boy Erased. But in real terms, his last good lead was 2016’s The Nice Guys (in which he played straight man to Ryan Gosling) and before that…probably, 2014’s Noah.

Given the career trajectory in which Crowe seems to be willingly hurtling, it shouldn’t be a surprise that Poker Face reeks like it does. With its alpha-male banter and millionaire’s playground vibe, his second film as a director (remember The Water Diviner?) is a genre hodgepodge - sometimes a Usual Suspects-type narrative puzzle, sometimes a fist-shake ode to mateship, all cut-and-pasted together with a slick shallowness that aspires to be at least Michael Bay, at best Ridley Scott (from whom Crowe had no less than five films on which to be mentored, and clearly wasn’t).

The film starts with a bush-set ‘70’s-era prologue in which five tight lads outwit a local bully in an impromptu poker showdown. Jumpcut to the present, by way of a self-indulgent sequence at a new-agey ‘wellness retreat’ overseen by an Obi-wan-esque Jack Thompson; wealthy tech magnate Jake (Crowe) has gathered those same boyhood friends for some high-stakes Texas Hold ‘em. Each is offered an enticement - keep the expensive designer wheels they arrived in, or play cards with $5 million house credit. Each has some backstory (though why Liam Hemsworth is hanging out with these much older men is never addressed), but…well, there’s your movie, right?

Sadly, no. Instead, we get subplot after subplot, each so diverting that Poker Face is soon careening off course -  a cancer diagnosis, unwanted pop-ins by family members, long passages of sensitive-male soul-searching (brought on by a ‘truth serum poison’, ffs) and an attempted art heist. So flawed is the structure that it may, in fact, be a homage to ‘80s-era straight-to-video dreck, so perfectly does it capture that sub-genre’s faux-macho posturing, bewilderingly silly plotting and retrograde use of women in support parts (Elsa Pataky’s chest gets a close-up before her face, so you’ve got that to look forward to, ladies). 

Crowe can’t claim disparate creative visions were at fault here. In addition to his derivative, uninspired direction, he reworked Stephen M. Coates’ script, affording the writer a ‘story’ and ‘original screenplay’ credit, but claiming his own ‘Screenplay by…’ and, in the icing on the vanity project cake, contributed five musical compositions. 

Local streamer Stan clearly backed Poker Face as a potentially prestigious piece of premium local content, the likes of which they’ve had some success with previously (I am Woman; Sunburnt Christmas; Relic; Gold; Nitram). But entrusting the project to a fading creative force like Crowe has left them holding the film equivalent of a 2-7 offsuit.

DEEP WATER

Stars: Ben Affleck, Ana de Armas, Tracy Letts, Grace Jenkins, Dash Mihook, Lil Rey Howley, Rachel Blanchard, Kristen Connelly, Jacob Elordi, Brendan Miller and Finn Wittrock
Writers: Zach Helm and Sam Levinson; based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith.
Director: Adrian Lyne 

Rating: ★ ★ ½

Deep Water is the fourth film starring Ben Affleck and his belle du jour, and none of them have been very good. In 2000, his love for the pre-Goop entrepreneur Gwyneth Paltrow led to the ill-fitting romance Bounce; as the miscast lead in Daredevil (2003), he made his missus Jennifer Garner do all the work; then, the infamous Gigli (also, 2003), a mega-dud in which the off-screen hots that he had for Jennifer Lopez somehow became a turgid, chemistry-free pairing in one of Hollywood’s biggest bombs.  

In his latest melding of the personal and professional, Affleck stars with now ex-girlfriend Ana De Armas, who was on a roll of spirited, sexy types when she shot this and No Time to Die a few years back (both, pre-Knives Out, a much better vehicle for her talents). Ben plays Vic, the cuckolded husband to Ana’s libidinous wife, Melinda; they have an arrangement that allows her to indulge with younger, fitter men than her hulking, surly husband, and she flaunts it at every opportunity. Most of the first half of the film is her drunkenly pashing strangers at parties while he watches on, blank-faced and increasingly agitated.

But there’s a dark cloud hanging over their upmarket Louisiana suburb - the unsolved murder of a young man, one of many who had been openly intimate (is that a thing?) with Melinda. Everybody kinda thinks Vic did it, but mostly turn the other cheek. Vic doesn’t really play it down - in fact, he frightens off Melinda’s latest conquest, blonde dufus Brendan Miller, by reminding him he’s the number one suspect in the murder of her last shag. Then, the death toll rises - piano player Jacob Elordi drowns, despite a very well-defined upper chest and arms, and goody-two-shoes hunk Finn Wittrock makes the mistake of going for a long drive with Vic.

Vic is a millionaire military-drone inventor, giving the film a streak of irony that never really plays out (he tortures himself by watching her, and all the town is watching him, while his toys watch the world). In the family mix is moppet daughter Trixie, played by Grace Jenkins giving a great ‘creepy kid’ performance (is she in on it with her dad??). And, to top it all off, Vic has a creepy hothouse out back where he breeds hundreds of snails that may or may not do his murderous bidding for him. Oh boy…  

Deep Water is the first film in 20 years for British director Adrian Lyne, a passion project adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s novel that has gone through umpteen false starts and several studio regimes. He last directed Diane Lane to an Oscar nomination for Unfaithful (2002), and, for two decades prior, crafted some of Hollywood’s most sexually-charged dramas - Foxes (1980) Flashdance (1983), 9½ Weeks (1986), Fatal Attraction (1987), Indecent Proposal (1993) and Lolita (1997). He was the go-to guy for manipulative relationship dynamics, gender politics, the dark heart of contemporary American marriage and frank sexuality, the likes of which few mainstream directors would covet.

Ultimately Deep Water is an unfocussed, occasionally confusing drama, which must rile Lyne, who would have seen the dramatic potential of the murky morality in Vic and Melinda’s life at some point in the project’s 20-year journey to the screen. His best films intellectualise the juicy plotting of your average airport novel; Deep Water just feels like an airport novel. 

It’s not without its watchable moments, most involving Ben and Ana striving for inclusion in the ‘married co-stars’ club alongside Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in their Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? prime, and tanking spectacularly. Deep Water is not Razzie-terrible, it’s just mildly OK, which is even more disappointing.

CLAW

Stars: Chynna Walker, Richard Rennie, Mel Mede, Ken ’Gabby’ Mertz and Roger the Raptor.
Writer: Gerald Rascionato and Joel Hogan
Director: Gerald Rascionato

WORLD PREMIERE: Byron Bay Underground Film Festival, Saturday May 22 at 8.30pm. Tickets available at the official festival website.

Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★

Eliciting the same thrills as the best moments from Jurassic Park and capturing the endearing buddy-comedy chemistry of cult fave Tremors, Claw proves a surefire crowd-pleaser. Clearly made with an un-ironic appreciation for the creature features of yesteryear (ie, the 90s) and a degree of skill that elevates the small scale production into something very big, director Gerald Rascionato’s monster-movie lark deserves global genre festival attention ahead of a long shelf life via whichever smart streamer acquires it.

Rascionato and co-writer Joel Hogan understand that the hard exposition work has already been done by Messrs Chrichton and Spielberg, so next-to-no time is spent on any of that ‘mosquito in amber’ malarkey (some razzle-dazzle gene-splicing graphics behind the opening credits suffices). Instead, their script invites the audience immediately into the friendship of Julia (Chynna Walker) and her bestie Kyle (Richard Rennie), deep in desert highway territory on their way to her big stand-up comedy break in LA. 

Circumstances dictate that they must spend the night with ghost town loner Ray (Mel Mede), an adventure that spins out of control when that most cinematic of prehistoric villains, the velociraptor (credited as ‘Roger the Raptor’), escapes from the confines of a nearby crazy scientist (Ken ’Gabby’ Mertz). The narrative proceeds to careen from one near-death escape to another, with just enough breathing space between the action to maintain audience empathy for the protagonists.

In a star-making turn, Walker’s small frame but strong physical presence is a major asset to the production; her confrontations with ‘Roger’ are legitimately thrilling. More importantly, the actress has a winning on-screen vibe with Rennie, who slots into the ‘damsel in distress’ role with endearing flair. Some of the script’s best moments involve the pair’s initial distrust of Mede’s Ray, recalling the ‘stereotype deconstruction’ genre comedy of 2010’s Tucker and Dale vs Evil, and are indicative of the smarter-than-usual investment that Hogan and Rascionato have written into their B-movie concept.

The director also takes cues from Spielberg’s other great monster movie Jaws, keeping his villain a growling presence largely in the shadows for much of the film’s first half. When unleashed, however, ‘Roger’ relentlessly pursues our heroes more in line with a Jason Vorhees/Michael Myers type. The effects team, supervised by industry veteran Steve Clarke, have crafted a top-tier CGI character that is seamlessly inserted into the action.

APARTMENT 1BR

Stars: Nicole Brydon Bloom, Alan Blumenfeld, Susan Davis, Naomi Grossman, Clayton Hoff, Giles Matthey, Taylor Nichols, Earnestine Phillips and Celeste Sully.
Writer/Director: David Marmor

Available in Australia on iTunes, Amazon, TelstraTV BoxOffice, Fetch TV, Youtube and on DVD from JB Hi-Fi. Distributed by Eagle Entertainment.

Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ 

Recalling Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby (1968) and Michael Winner’s The Sentinel (1977) in its depiction of the paranoid untwirling of a young woman’s psyche, David Marmor’s Apartment 1BR is a similarly tightly-wrought, singularly-focussed exercise in psychological and existential terror.

Sarah (Nicole Brydon Bloom) is only just finding her feet as an adult. Her temp job, however thankless, is secure, and the distance she is putting between herself and her father brings a new sense of calm (as does the Zoloft). However, like a great many Los Angelinos, taking control of your mind while establishing your own small portion of the city is a daunting task. When she finds a too-good-to-be-true rental in a classically Stucco-rendered gated complex, Sarah envisions her life taking on some kind of order; she promises the affable tenants committee that she will do all she can to fit into their order of living.

Her ideal apartment begins to go bump in the night to such a degree she becomes sleep-deprived, allowing doubt over her own powers of perception to creep in. Any deviation from what is accepted by the body corporate draws increasingly disturbing ire (let’s just say pets don’t fare well in these types of movies). Soon, Sarah’s defiance in the face of what the community requires of her spins the film into some chillingly realistic moments of horror.

As recently as one year ago (when Australian audiences first saw the film, then known as 1BR, at its Monster Fest premiere screenings) the key narrative elements were Sarah’s - one woman’s story, basking subtextually in #MeToo empowerment and self-realisation. But viewed again as we bear witness to the death throes of an administration fuelled by cult-like devotion and immoral, self-serving rationalisation, Marmor’s rogue’s gallery of bullying neighbours takes on razor-sharp real-world relevance. 

Willing to maim and torture (and more again) to ensure their collective social goals are met - goals that allude to the sanctimony of imbuing in oneself and those that follow you the moral high-ground - 1BR is as incisive a slice of pitch black social satire as it is a squirm-inducing horror film. Played to perfection by such everyperson character actor types as Naomi Grossman, Clayton Hoff, Giles Matthey and a terrifying Taylor Nichols, the tenants are so grotesquely normal in their appearance yet so vividly vile in the inhumanity of their society. 

The final frames hint that good people like Sarah need to stay alert and be ready to act and react, because gated communities festering with self-interest and privilege are everywhere. With his remarkable debut feature, David Marmor offers you a slice of American pie and rubs your face in it.

AN UNQUIET GRAVE

Stars: Jacob A. Ware and Christine Nyland.
Writers: Christine Nyland and Terence Krey.
Director: Terence Krey.

WORLD PREMIERE: Sunday October 11 at NIGHTSTREAM Virtual Film Festival, U.S.A.

Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ 

A sly, slow-burn two-hander exhibiting a genre heritage best described as ‘supernatural-noir’, An Unquiet Grave tightens the narrative screws with a mix of psychological thrills, grief-infused drama and OMG horror. Kept real by grounded depictions of desperation, sorrow and fear by two terrific lead performances, director Terence Krey’s high-end low-budgeter builds empathy and understanding for its protagonists before getting down and dirty in a pulse-quickening third act.

An established and respected ensemble player (notably in TV series like Boardwalk Empire and Graves), Jacob A. Ware takes full advantage of leading man status as ‘Jamie’, fleshing out the nuanced psychosis impacting a man still struggling with the death of his wife, Julie. A year on, he has taken to driving in the dark of night with Julie’s sister, Ava (Christine Nyland, who co-scripted), to the site where Julie died. Their shared hope is that Julie may not have lived her final days if what Jamie has learned is true.

Along the way, interaction between the pair waivers from warm and understanding to edgy and devious. Nyland and Krey’s script is a work of considerable skill, with each line playing a carefully constructed role in complicating character traits and strengthening the conceit. When the setting shifts from the front seat of the car to a cabin in the woods and the narrative spins from sideway glances and ambiguous wordplay to shovels and shallow graves, the transition is seamless. 

If, by the hour mark, you are wondering why The Unquiet Grave is bowing at the Nightstream horror fest, one especially challenging sequence will silence your concerns. While certainly a great visceral horror sequence, the reveal also reinforces the notion that the true horror in the story of these lost souls stems from their broken hearts.  

Krey, Nyland and Ware stay focussed on character and mood over genre tropes and histrionics, aided immeasurably by the artful eye of DOP Daniel Fox, who works wonders with a lot of single-source light/night-time location work. An Unquiet Grave is an assured genre exercise in the corrosive nature of profound sadness and how it can dissolve the moral core of good people.

BLUE MOON

Stars: Mark Hadlow, Jed Brophy, Olivia Hadlow and Doug Brooks.
Writer/Director: Stefen Harris.

Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★

Forty years of anger, resentment and bitter memories boil to the surface one fateful evening in a South Island gas station in the nerve-shredding two-hand crime thriller, Blue Moon. A gripping slice of Kiwi-noir that ticks all the boxes that rank truly great independent cinema, the second feature from real-life cop-turned-part-time filmmaker Stefen Harris is a supremely slick, psychologically taut and surprisingly engaging study of two desperate men and the ties that bind them.

Manning the midnight-to-dawn shift at the BP Motueka is Horace (Mark Hadlow), a middle-aged father of six teetering on the brink of financial ruin with long-in-development investment plans straining to stay together. His otherwise quiet night begins to unravel with the arrival of a blue Chevy Impala, carrying bad guy Reuben (Doug Brooks) and close to $500,000 in ill-gotten cash. Reuben’s fate plays into Horace’s plans for monetary redemption, albeit via compromising his own moral code, until leather-clad, shotgun-brandishing Darren (Jed Brophy) comes searching for the loot.

Harris works the first-half of his film with the assured hand of a genre pro, recalling the ‘small-town nobody’ character beats of a James M. Cain pulp-novel and neon-and-shadow classics like The Coen Bros.’ Blood Simple (1981) and Carl Franklin’s One False Move (1993). His blocking of scenes and building of tension in the predominantly single setting of the 24-hour convenience store is terrific.

His narrative invention doubles down on his technical prowess in Act 2, when it is revealed just how ‘small-town’ Motueka is; Horace and Darren have some shared baggage from a past dating back to their high-school days together. The half-million dollar criminal stakes suddenly have a slow-burn emotional intensity, fuelled by a boyhood definition of masculinity that sadly still drives these grown men.

Harris did some of his most instinctive work prior to his cameras rolling with the casting of his two leads and crewing reach. As Horace, aka ‘Toad’, Hadlow brings real-world emotional heft to his genre-thriller everyman; as Darren, aka ‘Ratty’, Brophy is towering tough-guy figure. Behind the scenes on what was reportedly a 6-day/NZ$12,000.00 shoot were the likes of sound engineer Ben Dunker (Inglorious Basterds, 2009), editor Judd Resnick (YellowBrickRoad, 2010), effects techie Dan Hennah (Lord of The Rings trilogy), composer Tane Upjohn-Beatson (collaborator on Harris’ 2009 debut feature, No Petrol No Diesel!) and hometown DOP Ryan O’Rourke. The result is a visually polished finished product, primed for the world market.

THE SOUL CONDUCTOR

Stars: Aleksandra Bortich, Evgeniy Tsyganov, Vladimir Yaglych, Aleksandr Robak, Vasiliy Bochkaryov and Ekaterina Rokotova.
Writers: Anna Kurbatova and Aleksandr Topuriya.
Director: Ilya S. Maksimov.

Screening at the 2018 Russian Resurrection Film Festival. Venue and session information available here.

Rating: ★★★★

The ties that bind us beyond the grave are explored within a thrilling supernatural framework in Ilya S. Maksimov’s The Soul Conductor (Provodnik). A ghost story that relies less on the ‘boo!’ factor and more on the haunting sadness of a life left incomplete, this high-end commercial entry from the Russian offices of 20th Century Fox offers both pensive, thoughtful meditation on regret and memory as well as spectacularly realised and chilling moments of modern movie horror.

Emerging star Aleksandra Bortich plays hardened 20-something Katya, a young woman not only able to see dead people but forced to co-exist with three desperate souls (Aleksandr Robak, Vasiliy Bochkaryov, Ekaterina Rokotova) who randomly materialise, often with their own agendas. Katya is also haunted by the grief of family tragedy; she was orphaned following a car accident that claimed both her parents, and is left shattered when her twin sister disappears, occasionally visiting Katya as an ethereal vision.

On top of all this burdensome emotional and supernatural baggage, Katya is drawn back to a decrepit mansion where, as a little girl, she witnessed an act of violent demonic transference (hence the title). The entity may have been responsible for the deaths of three young woman, blonde and blue-eyed like our protagonist, and Katya establishes an uneasy alliance with boozy career-detective Kapkov (Evgeniy Tsyganov) to bring about the beast’s downfall.

Bortich is a compelling presence, playing sweet and strong, damaged and defiant, with confidence and charisma that ought to be noticed by Hollywood suits keen to establish a new YA heroine figure (the 'Russian Jennifer Lawrence' tag is unavoidable). Scripted by Anna Kurbatova and Aleksandr Topuriya, The Soul Conductor affords the actress a multi-dimensional character the likes of which only emerges in those genre films with thematic weight to distill. The intrusion of memories into real life and the associated terror, grief and regret are played out convincingly by the 24 year-old Belarusian actress, who must also front up for the arduous physical acting required of a female lead battling a serial killer/satanic force.

The redemptive arc of the narrative is no surprise, but director Ilya S. Maksimov is making his film directorial debut after a decade in television, where clear, precise storytelling is a virtue; his skill at nailing strong story beats and maximising every frames potential is to the pics benefit. All other department heads under his watch provide slick, professional service, especially DOP and long-time collaborator Yuri Bekhterev, whose imagery is often breathtakingly lovely given the dark material.

THE MEG

Stars: Jason Statham, Li Bingbing, Rainn Wilson, Winston Chao, Cliff Curtis, Page Kennedy, Jessica McNamee, Ólafur Darri Ólafsson, Robert Taylor, Shuya Sophia and Masi Oka.
Writers: Dean Georgaris, Jon Hoeber and Erich Hoeber.
Director: Jon Turteltaub.

Rating: 2/5

For a movie so cynically calculated to hit all-important commercial KPIs, so much feels miscalculated about The Meg. The cheapest looking US$125million film ever made, joyless journeyman Jon Turteltaub’s big-shark movie drags the anchor for most of its interminable 113 minutes.  From the bored action lead routinely grimacing, to the beast itself, blessed with the natural skill to change size at will, The Meg seems destined to only find favour with snarky podcasters seeking schlocky targets for ridicule. 

The central ‘plot’ concerns a boozy ex-diver called Jonas (think about it…actually, don’t), drinking his life away in Thailand having lost two colleagues in the film’s lackluster prologue. Jason Statham plays ‘PTSD grief’ as script directions to be ignored; when called upon to return to the ocean depths to save a stranded submersible that contains his ex-wife (Jessica McNamee), he monologues with a grin about why he won’t do it, then jumps on board a helicopter to do it.

The clincher is that his ex may have just seen the same prehistoric beast that Jonas claimed was responsible for his crew’s death. Soon, he is on board the Mana One, an underwater research facility overseen by scumbag entrepreneur Rainn Wilson and peopled by Cliff Curtis’ boss-man, Ruby Rose’ feisty operations manager, Page Kennedy’s shrill nuisance DJ (the film’s most thankless part) and Li Bingbings’ single mother scientist (asked to pull off some excrutiating sentimentality with her on-screen daughter, Sophia Cai, and some chemistry-free romantic sparks with her leading man).

It takes Turteltaub and his trio(!) of writers 40-odd  minutes to shoehorn their moneymaker into the action, the Megalodon’s first appearance recalling the T-Rex reveal in Jurassic Park (the first and last time the movies will be compared, rest assured). The special effects that bring the Meg to life run the gamut from state-of-the-art (a midpoint sequence in which the shark closes in on Statham and Bingbing as they are being reeled in is the film’s best action) to Jaws-3 clunky. The PG-13 framework means kills are meagre by any horror buff’s measure; barring one legitimately hilarious sight gag involving a helicopter pilot, humour is barren (note to the producers – you owe the Sharknado franchise an acknowledgement for stealing their closing shot gag).

Everything about the movie – the cool posters, the fun trailer, the decade-long development history, the mystery behind what horror auteur Eli Roth once might have seen in the insipid material  – is infinitely more interesting than anything that made it into the movie. The Meg is so bound to the ‘studio blockbuster’ template, it never breathes; that’s perhaps appropriate, given its waterlogged staidness, but it leaves this hulking behemoth dead in the water.