A schlubby psycho weaponizes sharks against his victims in Dangerous Animals

One thing you can say about Dangerous Animals is that it delivers on the promise of the trailer: It’s definitely a movie about a serial killer who uses sharks as his weapon of choice. More serial killer film than shark attack film, the movie follows a lone-wolf travelling surfer, Zephyr (Hassie Harrison), who must survive after being kidnapped by “swim with the sharks” tour guide, Tucker (Jai Courtney), who likes to create home-grown snuff videos for his own fulfilment. 

Structured around a series of escalating obstacles, Dangerous Animals doesn’t necessarily pull punches when it comes to gross-out and gore moments. The film seems particularly suited to a crowded theatre experience where audiences will groan in repulsion and frustration, as each narrative beat seems to fumble into the next, and anticipation and expectation are undercut by a series of frustrating detours. 

For this reason, Dangerous Animals is fun, despite the fact it often feels more like a genre exercise than something substantial. Leaning hard into its R rating (13+ in Quebec) means that it doesn’t feel like a cheap, PG, choose your own adventure film, but it would also be generous to suggest it’s anything more than that. Despite the escalating series of absurdities, the movie can’t quite overcome feeling overly familiar as it fails to transcend the tropes and clichés it relies heavily on. 

Part of the issue is tonal; the absurdity of the premise is a little too grounded in reality. The movie may be violent, but it can’t quite strike the right balance between gritty realism and cartoonality to be especially effective. Jai Courtney does the most as the serial killer, trying to counterbalance the paucity of writing to create a dynamite and perverse villain. He feels more schlubby than threatening, but remains relatively interesting to watch. As hardened as Zephyr is on paper, she’s not necessarily a dynamite character either, often pulled between various clichés that don’t amount to very much. Her quirks feel tacked on rather than embodied, but to Hassie Harrison’s credit, she delivers at least one killer monologue that temporarily roots the film in some real emotional stakes.

Surprisingly, it’s a rather minor role that steals the show. While relatively inconsequential plot-wise, Zephyr’s cellmate Heather, played by Ella Newton, stands out in the cast. Despite a much smaller role, Newton mines the fragility of her character for something that rises above the broad strokes of the rest of the film. While everyone else is doing either too much or too little, she manages to feel both real and unusual. Her character’s gentleness presents as a kind of fierce survivalism rather than weakness. Her awkward smile and playful eyes push the performance into unconventional but supremely effective choices that are surprising and endearing. 

Unlike Sean Byrne’s previous films, The Loved Ones and The Devil’s Candy, Dangerous Animals ends up feeling fairly conventional. Though rooted in the same bait and switch style horror surprises, the movie lacks as many memorable moments. The final act delivers on some big shocks, but overall Dangerous Animals feels strangely muted. The premise of the sharks as weapons is far too outsized for the capabilities of the budget or filmmaking, and the heavy use of animal CGI undersells the more raw and authentic moments. 

Dangerous Animals doesn’t really transcend what it tries to do, but there are worse ways you could spend your time at the theatre. It’s a shame that the film couldn’t go full throttle into absurdity when it comes to its premise. Considering it’s so hinged on being a shark movie, too, the cheap look of the effects absolutely tanks a lot of the film’s effectiveness. ■

Dangerous Animals is now playing in Montreal theatres.

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