Shark movies are a dime-a-dozen these days and it seems like we get several new ones each year. We’ve reached a point to where it’s rare to find a shark movie that offers something original. “Dangerous Animals” certainly does, although reducing it to a simple shark movie is patently unfair. It’s more of a high-stakes blend of deepwater horror and serial killer tension. And it’s driven by a brilliantly menacing Jai Courtney.

Directed by Sean Byrne, “Dangerous Animals” tells a taut tale that is unquestionably outrageous yet never feels outrageous in the moment. That’s because Byrne has a good grip on screenwriter Nick Lepard’s material and he knows how to immerse his audience in the kind of movie he’s making. There’s a nastiness to it that approaches exploitation yet Byrne (smartly) doesn’t take things too seriously. It results in a visceral and at times darkly funny genre cocktail that stands as one of the bigger surprises of the year.

Hassie Harrison plays Zephyr, a free-spirited American surfer living out of her van on Australia’s Gold Coast. Old baggage from her past led her to become a loner. But we see a small crack in her self-established walls when Zephyr meets Moses (Josh Heuston), a sweet and smitten real estate agent who also enjoys surfing. After spending the night together, Zephyr takes off to wrestle with these newfound feelings she has.

But before their potentially cheesy love story can get off the ground, things take a terrifying turn. While parking her van near the beach for the evening, Zephyr is attacked, sedated, and kidnapped. She wakes up in a metal room with another young woman named Heather (Ella Newton). We quickly learn they’re in the belly of a ship belonging to the burly Tucker (Courtney).

Tucker takes vacationers out to sea for private underwater shark encounters. But that’s just a facade. In reality he’s a maniacal serial killer who gets his kicks chumming the water and then feeding his victims to the sharks. To make it more unsettling, he films their gruesome deaths with an old VHS camcorder. And let’s just say he has a pretty large home movie collection. But the determined and resourceful Zephyr proves to be Tucker’s biggest challenge and she’s not willing to go down (literally) without a fight.

Within the first ten minutes it becomes obvious the title “Dangerous Animals” is referring to more than the well-known ocean predators. The much bigger threat is Tucker who is as mesmerizing as he is sadistic. Courtney is a psychotic force of nature, delivering a brawny, unnerving performance that’s laced with a disarming charm. Byre gives Courtney room to create a truly memorable villain, leaning into his star rather than over-explaining his character’s psychopathy.

“Dangerous Animals” hits its mark thanks to its straightforward storytelling approach and a truly sinister undercurrent. The film is a nail-biting thriller at heart but with a chilling horror movie edge. Add in a dash of sharksploitation and a career best performance from Jai Courtney and you’ve got a wildly entertaining feature with a gnarly B-movie bite. See it on the big screen; see it with a crowd. “Dangerous Animals” opens June 6th exclusively in theaters.

VERDICT – 4 STARS