After facing the likes of Vin Diesel and Dwayne Johnson, Jason Statham is looking for bigger fish to fry -- and he's found one.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the action star has signed on to "Meg," the long-brewing adaptation of the 1997 sci-fi novel by Steve Alten. Jon Turteltaub ("National Treasure") is attached to direct.

In the works for the better part of two decades, the Warner Bros. film centers on a U.S. Navy deep-sea diver who comes face to face with a Carcharodon Megalodon -- a 70-foot, 40-ton prehistoric ancestor of the great white shark -- while on a top-secret mission. Written off as a crackpot, he becomes determined to prove the Megalodon is real.

Chinese company Gravity will co-finance the film with Warner Bros.