Dangerous Animals (Australia, 2025)

As I mentioned in my reviews of 47 Metres Down and Under Paris, I’m a sucker for films about sharks. I was obsessed with sharks when I was a kid, reading countless books about them and watching every shark movie I could, no matter how awful. While I largely outgrew this, it’s still pretty easy to sell me on a shark film, and so Dangerous Animals went straight on my list.

It also helped that I’d enjoyed director Sean Byrne’s two previous films, The Loved Ones and The Devil’s Candy. This is the first of his features that he didn’t also write, however, so I was interested to see what difference that might make.

Dangerous Animals is currently streaming on Now TV in the UK.

Synopsis

Greg and Heather, a couple of tourists in Australia decide to take a spur-of-the moment shark-watching trip with Tucker’s Shark Experience. They are oblivious enough not to be concerned when Tucker comments “I guess no one knows you’re here, then”. And as if that weren’t enough of a red flag, Tucker tells them how he survived a shark attack as a child and now believes that “God’s down there”. Yet they are still surprised when Tucker stabs Greg, throws his corpse overboard, and then takes Heather captive.

Meanwhile, on land, American surfer Zephyr has a meet cute with local estate agent Moses. They spend the night together in Zephyr’s camper van, but she sneaks off before dawn to go surfing. There, she is kidnapped by Tucker and taken to his boat, where Heather is still chained to a bed.

As Zephyr struggles to escape, she and Heather discover just how deep Tucker’s obsession with sharks runs.

Will Zephyr avoid becoming a shark’s dinner? Will Moses work out that she’s not just ghosting him before she becomes an actual ghost? And why do weird murderers insist on using analogue media to document their crimes?

General Thoughts

Much as with Heretic, the main appeal of Dangerous Animals is the sheer charisma of its antagonist. Jai Courtney is more intimidating than Hugh Grant, especially physically, but his performance as Tucker is utterly charming in places. It’s easy to see how this kind of psychopath could be so disarming, and watching his mask drop provides some of the film’s most chilling moments. Courtney’s physicality helps sell the menace when this happens, showing us Tucker as a brutal and efficient monster.

Dangerous Animals is an unusually sun-drenched horror film. While the climactic scenes take place at night, most of the build-up is set in dazzling daytime. This certainly makes it stand out, and it allows Byrne to show off the Gold Coast and the surrounding ocean in a way that might entice tourists if not for all the bloody murder.

While, of course there is a great white shark in the film, it was nice to see some variety, with makos and what I think were blue sharks featuring prominently.

Having seen Roadgames a couple of days ago, I couldn’t help but note that this is another Australian film with an American lead. It’s something that a number of British horror films have also resorted to. It does sometimes feel like the money behind a film insists on making it as palatable as possible to American audiences, including limiting the number of strange accents they have to endure. I’m reminded of how Clive Barker had to redub the London accents of supporting actors in Hellraiser because the producers were worried that audiences in the Midwest would find them off-putting.

The Ending

Speaking of compromises, I’m about to discuss the ending. While I shan’t go into detail, you should skip ahead to the next section if you want to remain completely unspoiled.

I would think a lot more highly of Dangerous Animals if it had stopped three minutes earlier than it did. The ending we get is a very neat Hollywood one, with the villain punished appropriately and the heroes surviving against the odds. Just moments before, however, we saw what could have been a spectacularly dark and ironic resolution, leaning heavily into the themes of becoming a monster to face one’s fears. And then it was all undone.

While I’ve not been able to find any articles to confirm my suspicion, this seems like exactly the kind of ending that was hastily rewritten or reshot after testing badly. If this is the case, they did the film a real disservice. That darker ending could have made Dangerous Animals the kind of film horror fans would speak of for years after. As things stand, it’s a fine thriller, but one that feels ironically toothless.

Verdict

There is a lot to like about Dangerous Animals. It’s a tense, bloody thriller, executed with style. The performances are terrific, especially Jai Courtney. While the story itself is pretty simple, and we’ve all seen plenty of films involving cat-and-mouse games with murderous psychopaths, there are enough twists and turns to keep us off-balance.

This is a pretty violent film, with characters inflicting serious trauma on each other throughout. I did have to look away from one scene involving hand mutilation that reminded me a little of Gerald’s Game. What it is oddly short of, however, is shark attacks. It’s not that there are none, but for a film about a murderer who feeds people to sharks, you might expect more of them.

With a darker ending, Dangerous Animals could have been one of my films of the month. It’s pacey, entertaining, and beautifully made. As things stand, however, it’s a near miss.

The October Horror Movie Challenge

Please do join in and share your own thoughts with us about this or any other films as the month goes on. You can usually find us on BlueSky, Reddit, Discord, or lurking in the dark corners of your home.

If you would like to play along at home, my provisional selections are:

Heretic (USA, 2024)
The Sadness (Taiwan, 2021)
The Uninvited (USA, 1944)
The Lodge (UK/USA, 2019)
WolfCop (Canada, 2014)
Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (Czechoslovakia, 1970)
The Monkey (USA, 2025)
Sister Midnight (India/UK, 2024)
Roadgames (Australia, 1981)
Nightmare City (Italy, 1985)
Dangerous Animals (Australia, 2025)
Dead Talents Society (Taiwan, 2024)
Winterbeast (USA, 1992)
Byzantium (UK/Ireland, 2013)
The Ugly Stepsister (Norway, 2025)
A Page of Madness (Japan, 1926)
Heart Eyes (USA, 2025)
Grafted (New Zealand, 2024)
Arrebato (Spain, 1979)
Hatching (Finland, 2022)
Abigail (USA, 2024)
Ganja & Hess (USA, 1973)
The Devil’s Bath (Austria, 2025)
Pieces (Spain, 1982)
Infested (France, 2023)
Best Wishes to All (Japan, 2022)
A Cat in the Brain (Italy, 1990)
Enys Men (UK, 2022)
Creature From the Black Lagoon (USA, 1954)
Perewangan (Indonesia, 2024)
Bring Her Back (Australia, 2025)

A Final Note

If you have been enticed here by these posts, please do look around at some of our other film reviews. We also have a podcast, called The Good Friends of Jackson Elias, which occasionally covers horror films. If this appeals, you might want to check out some of the following episodes.