Dangerous Animals: Review. By Daniel Rester

Australian director Sean Byrne is back with his latest horror film, Dangerous Animals. He doesn’t make films often, but when he does it is exciting news for genre fans. Byrne’s first two pictures, The Loved Ones (2010) and The Devil’s Candy (2017), were full of terrific performances and wild surprises. Dangerous Animals is no different there, though it’s maybe not quite as strong overall. 

Hassie Harrison plays Zephyr, an American drifter and surfer who is exploring the sunny coasts of Australia. She has a one-night stand with a kind guy named Moses (Josh Heuston), who tries to connect with her further. She goes out to surf one morning without Moses and is abducted by Tucker (Jai Courtney), a serial killer who lures in tourists to go shark watching before killing them off. Sometimes that involves feeding them to the sharks themselves. 

Dangerous Animals is a lean and mean B movie with arguably Courtney’s best performance to date. Harrison, Heuston, and the rest of the cast members are solid, but this is Courtney’s show. It’s a performance that reminded me of Hugh Grant’s work in Heretic (2024), with Courtney bringing sinister charisma to a dark but intriguing character. I was excited to see what decisions the actor would make next as the character dances strangely, barks like a dog, and waxes poetic about everything from God to marlins. 

This is the first film by Byrne not to be written by the director himself. The script instead comes from Nick Lepard, and it looks like this is his first credit. It’s a promising start for the writer as the film has a dynamite premise, characters who make mostly smart decisions, and shocking situations. It’s not Shakespeare, but for a screenplay about a murderer obsessed with sharks it is efficient and clever. 

Byrne keeps Dangerous Animals moving with his deft direction, with the film only dragging in the final third. He and his team also capture the shimmering ocean and Tucker’s dirty shipping boat in interesting manners. There are lots of little details that help bring the world to life, from past victims’ names etched into the boat’s walls to Tucker’s extensive VHS tape collection. 

The soundtrack to the film has some great rock songs. The music score by Michael Yezerski, however, is obtrusive. The score never misses a moment to be loud and thumping in order to underline intense scenes. It’s not terrible work, but it’s too obvious and outsized. 

Dangerous Animals is no Jaws (1975). What films are? But it is a sharp little horror flick that blends serial killer and shark tropes together well as Byrne and Courtney surprise the audience. Hopefully it won’t be another eight years until we see a film by Byrne again. 

Rating: 7/10

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