You’re Gonna Need A Bigger Shark

You may recall a few months back we reported on the development of Meg the latest book to film adaptation of a story about a giant shark. Well, after spending a bit of time in turnaround (or as it is sometimes referred to, "we dare you to find a studio dumb enough to meet our demands for buying this"), the good news today is that New Line have picked up the rights from Disney to make it, and they're looking to fast-track the production in time for a summer 2006 release. This is a terrific step forward for the project, especially as it's been granted a very healthy $75 million budget while Shane Salerno is still rewriting it. Not familiar with the story? Well, let's recap. Meg is Steve Alton's story of a giant (about 80ft long) prehistoric shark. Shark gets found by adventurer, shark causes havoc, tense set pieces ensue etc. According to our resident bookworm Helen O'Hara, the book has stock characters and doesn't deviate too far from formula, but has a fantastically pulpy quality to it that makes it near un-put-downable. So far, so Deep Blue Sea. But this film has a few advantages over Renny Harlin's flawed popcorner