Meg - Gigantic Shark Movie

[WorkShed]

I love Jaws. Who doesn't. So when there's the chance that Steve Alten's awe-inspiring novel Meg will come to the big screen, I'm biting at it (pun intended).

Here's a piece of promotional art for the film and a possible Visual Effects presentation reel for the film.



Awesome CG shark footage

What do you think? Should Meg see release in theaters all over the world?

[Jake]

wow, I don't know if I can stomach ANOTHER shark movie but the CGI looks damn good, few years from now we won't be able to tell reality from computer at all. Hmmm, I still remember when doing CGI smoke or water were absolutely unheard of.

[WorkShed]

I still think that the CG water tube-thing in The Abyss is pretty badass.

[Jake]

yeah I agree, The Abyss was a great movie, I especially liked the pink "breathing" fluid

[wirm]

I enjoyed Alten's meg series. But at the same time, there have been an awful lot of shark movies on the Sci-Fi channel. It'd better be good.

[Hardkore]

http://www.stevealten.com/Meg/home.htm

Storyline:

On a top-secret dive into the Pacific Ocean's deepest canyon, Jonas Taylor found himself face-to-face with the largest and most ferocious predator in the history of the animal kingdom. The sole survivor of the mission, Taylor is haunted by what he's sure he saw but still can't prove exists - Carcharodon megalodon, the massive mother of the great white shark. The average prehistoric Meg weighs in at twenty tons and could tear apart a Tyrannosaurus rex in seconds.

Written off as a crackpot suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, Taylor refuses to forget the depths that nearly cost him his life. With a Ph.D. in paleontology under his belt, Taylor spends years theorizing, lecturing, and writing about the possibility that Meg still feeds at the deepest levels of the sea. But it takes an old friend in need to get him to return to the water, and a hotshot female submarine pilot to dare him back into a high-tech miniature sub.

Diving deeper than he ever has before, Taylor will face terror like he's never imagined, and what he finds could turn the tides bloody red until the end of time. MEG is about to surface. When she does, nothing and no one is going to be safe, and Jonas must face his greatest fear once again.



This is one of those films that has been through development hell for some time.

Here is an articles at the LA Times about the history of the development for the movie.

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment...9.story?page=1

The article points out that back in 1998, the film was put in turnaround considering Warner Brothers release of Deep Blue Sea.

I recently came across these.

http://www.slashfilm.com/2008/04/13/...g-fowardagain/

http://screenrant.com/archives/is-me...m-ad-1560.html

http://www.shocktillyoudrop.com/news...ws.php?id=5593

Apelles Publishing Inc. has bought the rights with two major producers onboard, Lawrence Gordon and Lloyd Levin, who are bringing us Hellboy II and Watchmen. They will produce the film independently (can you say, "$150 million budget?!"), which means no studio to interfere with the production, or put it in turnaround. However, a studio will step up to distribute the film, much like Fox and five of the six Star Wars films. No word on de Bont directing still.


Assuming the film does well,there are already 2 other books written,with the 4th due out soon

Book 2~ The Trench

Its appetite is ravenous. Its teeth scalpel-sharp. Its power unstoppable as it smashes the steel doors holding it in a Monterey Aquarium. For the first time, the captive twenty-ton Megalodon shark has tasted human blood, and it wants more. Now, it's feeding time.

On the other side of the world, in the silent depths of the ocean, lies the Mariana Trench, where the Megalodon has spawned since the dawn of time. Paleo-biologist Jonas Taylor once dared to enter this perilous cavern. And he wears the painful scars of that deadly encounter. Now, as the body count rises and the horror of a monster's attack grips the California coast, Jonas must begin the hunt again.

But to do it means returning to the dark terror of the trench... where the MEG is waiting. Using himself as bait, Jonas will enter the ultimate battle - a fight to the death between man and beast in the darkest recesses of the ocean, and a fight for his sanity from the depths of his own tormented soul.



Book 3~ Meg: Primal Waters

Eighteen years have passed since Angel broke free of the Tanaka Lagoon and returned to the Mariana Trench. Meanwhile, Jonas Taylor-adventurer, has become Jonas Taylor, middle-aged father of two, overwhelmed by mountains of bills and the daily strife of raising a family. But life is about to change.

A Hollywood television producer wants Jonas to join his new survival series: DAREDEVILS. For the next six weeks, two teams of crazy daredevils on a South Pacific ocean voyage on-board a replica of a Spanish Galleon will try to outperform one another in front of the cameras.

Jonas needs the money, and the job seems easy enough - doing color commentary. But behind the scenes, someone else is pulling the strings. And before it's over, Jonas, Terry, and Mac will again come face to face with the most dangerous creatures ever to stalk the Earth.

Book 4 ~MEG:Hell's Aquarium
The recaptured Angel has birthed three pups, a male and two vicious females, one albino, the other lead-gray pigmented. Meanwhile, an expedition is underway to find the 120 foot creature Michael Maren discussed in Primal Waters...




http://www.stevealten.com/dl_images/3.jpg

[j7wild]

this is a movie that should be directed by Ridley Scott or James Cameron or if they can afford it, Steven Spielberg!!

[Hardkore]

The movie has finally been greenlit. http:// http://www.tracking-board.co...o-warner-bros/


The project has famously been in development hell for nearly twenty years.

The long-gestating adaptation of NY Times Bestseller MEG is now moving forward at Warner Bros. Sources reveal that the project, which has had three different homes over nearly twenty years, is a priority development. Described so eloquently as “Jurassic Park with a shark,” the film is based on the original bestselling novel Meg: A Novel Of Deep Terror written by Steve Alten, which centers on two men from opposite points of view that are forced to band together in order to neutralize the terror that’s threatening the California coast.

The Manchurian Candidate and Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life scribe Dean Georgaris scripted the latest draft of the adaptation, taking over for the nearly seven previous writers, including Alten, that penned different versions throughout the years. Sources reveal that Warner is currently in the midst of finding a director for the project. Veteran producer Colin Wilson, who has long been attached, will produce alongside Belle Avery, while Andrew Fischel and Cate Adams will oversee development for Warner.

Much like the dead creature on which the film is based, the project itself was at multiple instances extinct. The Meg adaptation was initially set up at Disney in 1997 when the book was published, a bid which cost the studio nearly a one million. The project eventually went into turnaround after Disney caught cold feet about competing with Warner’s 1999 killer shark pic Deep Blue Sea. Alten, frustrated at the lack of movement on the project, wrote his own draft which he showed to Nick Nunziata, who then in turn delivered to Guillermo Del Toro.


Del Toro took the project to Larry Gordon and Lloyd Levin, who brought on Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life director Jan De Bont to helm. New Line Cinema then nabbed the rights in 2005 for a reported mid-six against seven-figures, and for years the project was in heavy development.

Nunziata, Del Toro, Gordon, Levin, Ken Atchity and Chi-Li Wong produced, with Shane Salerno scripting. New Line was so confident in Meg that the project was fast-tracked with a 2006 summer release date and an estimated $80-million budget, with the project even pitched to foreign distributors at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival.

De Bont went so far as to hire a production team consisting of Wilson (Jurassic Park, Avatar), production designer Bill Sandell (The Perfect Storm, Deep Blue Sea), and visual effects supervisor John Nelson (Gladiator, Iron Man). The team went on to develop animatics, storyboards, and even built a 5 foot clay/fiberglass model of the titular sea monster.

However, it appeared that New Line had jumped the shark, as Meg‘s price tag began to grow drastically higher and anticipated to push nearly $200 million. Recent box office disappointments urged concern and the studio ordered a cut to $125 million. Despite cuts being made, New Line still wanted more, leading to the film’s producers and creatives jumping ship. New Line’s adaptation eventually sunk, and the rights reverted back to Alten in 2007, who continued to push for the film to be made. Now, eight years later, the rights have landed at Warner and the project is back on track.


Alten’s bestselling debut novel, which was a hit at the Frankfurt Book Fair at the time of its release, was so successful that is spawned three sequels. The series follows a team of scientists that must capture a massive prehistoric shark, long believed to be extinct, that becomes unearthed from the depths of the Mariana Trench. The species in question is that of the Carcharodon Megalodon, an apex predator that reached nearly 80 ft, and went extinct around two million years ago.

Wilson, who has been attached to the project since the New Line stint, has worked on a number of classic blockbusters, including Jurassic Park, Avatar, War of The Worlds, and Troy. Up next, he’s currently serving as an executive producer on Warner’s forthcoming supervillain ensemble Suicide Squad, which stars Will Smith, Margot Robbie, and Jared Leto.

Though uncredited, Georgaris has worked on Life of Pi, Wanted, and Mission Impossible III. A producer and writer, he’s currently scripting Hasbro’s Stretch Armstrong adaptation, as well as producing Paramount’s fantasy The Girl Who Could Fly and horror comic adaptation Damn Nation. He’s repped by WME and Media Talent Group.