‘Dangerous Animals’ review: Jai Courtney goes sublimely savage as a shark-centric serial killer

Dangerous Animals has a killer hook: Jai Courtney stars as a deranged serial killer who uses sharks as his weapon of choice.

It sounds bonkers, like something you’d see in an old Batman comic, in an Austin Powers movie, or on late-night TV, back when the ads were all 1-900 numbers. But props to screenwriter Nick Lepard and director Sean Byrne. They bring blood and bite to this funky premise, delivering a movie that’s deep in dread, sweat, thrills, and chills. 

Sure, when sharks swim into horror, things can get pretty gnarly. The all-time classic is Jaws, where the gore of chewed-up human remains is balanced with an engaging character-driven drama. Splashier slaughters came from that seminal film’s more vicious offspring, ranging from the shark slasher Deep Blue Sea to more realistic thrillers like The Shallows and 47 Meters Down, with the over-the-top Jason Statham adventure The Meg and the proudly trashy Sharknado film series taking a more gonzo approach to the subgenre.

Yet, Dangerous Animals isn’t of this breed. Instead, sharks in this movie are sort of a bait and switch for something more surprising and far more sinister. 

Dangerous Animals is more serial killer horror than shark creature feature. 

Hassie Harrison plays Zephyr in “Dangerous Animals.”
Credit: IFC Films

Those familiar with Sean Byrne’s previous films may not be surprised to discover the sharks aren’t the scariest things in Dangerous Animals. No shade to these kings of the ocean. Cinematographer Shelley Farthing-Dawe and editor Kasra Rassoulzadegan masterfully capture and edit shots of sharks swimming with a delicious sense of menace. Some such scenes are so striking in the way they portray the power and size of these creatures that it literally took my breath away. But sharks are not the monsters in this movie. They’re just being sharks!

The monster here is Tucker (Courtney), a sun-cooked Aussie who makes a living on the Gold Coast by taking tourists out on his boat to go on shark dives. Sure, many come and go with nothing but a brush with nature and happy memories. But from the film’s frightening opening sequence, audiences are made aware of Tucker’s dark side. It’s not just chum this rugged fellow tosses overboard to the sharks. He feeds them ritualistically, feeling a deep connection to the beasts and taking special pleasure in watching them feast  — on young women specifically.

This is in line with Byrne’s brand of horror, which tends to center the terrible things mankind does to its own. The Aussie filmmaker made his debut with 2009’s The Loved Ones, which centered on a teen girl taking out her most twisted desires on a kidnapped crush. Then in 2015 came The Devil’s Candy, starring Ethan Embry as a family man (and metalhead) who strives to protect his teen daughter from the homicidal urges of a mentally ill (or arguably possessed) old man.

Dangerous Animals feels a natural progression for Byrne, containing the heavy-metal energy of his sophomore film with the sadistic glee of his first. And Courtney proves his pitch-perfect collaborator in making a movie that’s unrelentingly twisted and rousingly entertaining. 

Jai Courtney is a rip-roaring force of nature in Dangerous Animals. 

Jai Courtney plays a serial killer who uses sharks as a weapon in “Dangerous Animals.”
Credit: IFC Films

The Australian actor has had a fascinating career, having been floated as a possible predecessor for Bruce Willis in the universally panned A Good Day to Die Hard in 2013. He’s appeared in several action franchise movies since then, from Divergent to Terminator: Genisys to 2016’s Suicide Squad and its odd 2021 pseudo-sequel. But only the last of these — where he played the wild card DC supervillain Captain Boomerang — gave a sense of the unique dichotomy of Courtney’s abilities. 

Broad-shouldered and handsome, he’s a natural fit for the action hero mold. But his performance in David Ayer’s Suicide Squad showed Courtney could be funny and get weird with it. It was an exhilarating rush to watch him do just that. In Dangerous Animals, he is unleashed. Forget the serious brooding or dashing swagger of bog-standard leading men. Courtney has something more rare and beguiling, a crooked smile that promises trouble and a wild eye that threatens carnage.

In Dangerous Animals, Tucker’s sheer brute force makes him scary. But Courtney, finding the fun in playing such a monster, makes the character instantly iconic. He is so undeniably charming in tourist-pleasing mode that it’s easy to see how his prey is lured in. For the free-spirited surfer named Zephyr (Hassie Harrison), the heroine at the heart of Dangerous Animals, he disarms her by offering her a favor — no strings attached. But just as quickly as he can flash his teeth in a smile, he can bite. And this makes Byrne’s movie more than just a torrid thriller. 

Dangerous Animals is a mesmerizing horror story about toxic masculinity. 

Tucker loves the sound of his own voice. While keeping women locked away in an effectively sound-proofed cell on his boat, he delivers unwelcomed speeches about the nature of animals. Courtney captures the snarling bravado heard on countless macho podcasts, as he drops fun facts about sharks, snakes, and marlins, applying a philosophical varnish on his violence against women. But the visual details of Tucker’s ritual, which involves vintage VHS tapes and DIY lures, suggest a more psychological motive rooted in misogyny. And this psychology is just as disturbing as the scenes of violence and slaughter by shark. 

In Dangerous Animals, Byrne and Courtney give us a mesmerizing portrait of toxic masculinity. Tucker compares himself to sharks, because as a man he feels insufficient, especially in the face of women like Zephyr. There’s even an implication of impotence that evokes Luis Buñuel’s The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz, where a man aspires to murder women but never does so by his own hand. Similarly, Tucker uses sharks to commit his crimes.

Terrifying in a real-world sense, Tucker has mastered hiding his rage until he’s out on the sea, where there’s nowhere to run. The way he can switch from an affable bogan to a snarling beast is riveting, not only for Courtney’s quickness but also because this terrible transformation reflects a common fear women have that any random smiling guy on the street might be a monster just beneath the surface. (See the man versus bear debate of 2024.) 

Remarkably, as thematically dark as Dangerous Animals is, watching it is electrifying and wickedly fun. Whether small-talking with a scruffy local, rigging up a victim for feeding time, or dancing around ritualistically to rock music in red underwear, Courtney is a live wire, sparking so intensely that his villain seems capable of anything.

Cheers to Harrison who matches his energy with a solid disgust as Zephyr. Together, they build a cat-and-mouse tale that is jolting, in the way of Byrne’s previous films. Just when you think you know where Dangerous Animals is going, it dives even deeper and darker, and we’re left catching our breath.

Simply put, Dangerous Animals is a satisfying, sick, and devilishly smart thriller that will excite you in theaters and stalk you on the way home. 

Dangerous Animals was reviewed out of its World Premiere at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival. The movie will open in theaters in the U.S. on June 12.