Cinema's apex predator
Photo by Vertgo Releasing
Jaws wasn't the first shark movie. (That's a 1969 adventure called Shark! directed by Sam Fuller and starring Burt Reynolds.) But it was Jaws, released 50 years ago this month, that effectively launched an entire genre as well as redefining the summer blockbuster.
The form had such energy that it soon metamorphosed beyond sharks. Alien (1979) was pitched to studio executives as 'Jaws in space'. Films were made starring orcas, alligators, barracudas and, triumphantly, piranhas. Sharks themselves mutated mightily too. In Deep Blue Sea (1999), a super-intelligent mako eats Samuel L Jackson. In The Meg (2018), Jason Statham bests a monster revived from prehistory. In Sharknado (2013), sharks take over Los Angeles via tornados. In Under Paris (2024), they swarm the City of Light via the Seine and the catacombs.
Some films have been genuinely scary. Open Water (2003), about a couple accidentally left behind mid ocean, based on a true story and produced on a tiny budget, is traumatising; The Shallows (2016), in which a great white takes against Blake Lively, stuck just 200 yards offshore, is thrilling. But there has also been a serious pushback against the shark-demonisation industry. Worldwide, fewer than ten people a year are killed by shark attack. In comparison, stepladders are a holy terror, toasters the pitiless enemy of all mankind. And, contrariwise, 100 million sharks yearly are killed and eaten, or otherwise consumed, as oil in cosmetics, for example.
So we have long been overdue a correction, not perhaps a shark buddy movie, but one that allows us the full frisson while reminding us that people are worse. Dangerous Animals, a serial-killer/shark mash-up, is the third film by the Tasmanian-born Sean Byrne, in succession to The Loved Ones (2009), a high-school/torture-porn hybrid, and The Devil's Candy (2017), a US-set heavy-metal/haunted-house horror.
On Queensland's Gold Coast, a pair of Canadian and English gap-year innocents arrive at a dock for 'Tuckers Experience' (cage-diving with sharks). Tucker turns out to be massive, matey Jai Courtney (Captain Boomerang in Suicide Squad). Soon they're setting off to sea, despite Tucker having asked them, 'So no one even knows you're here then?' – often a warning sign.
En route, Tucker tells them how he was bitten by a great white when he was seven, showing them a gruesome scar. 'It's not the shark's fault,' he says. Then he helps them get their nerve up for the dive via 'an ancient relaxation practice', breathing followed by his rendition of the world's worst earworm: 'Baby Shark, doo doo di doo…'. The dive goes fine; the sharks (genuinely filmed, not mechanical) are beautiful. What happens when they get back on deck, relieved and exhilarated, is not fine. Tucker, we discover, likes to feed his victims to the sharks, dangling them from a giant boom, while he videotapes the show. More his fault than the sharks', really.
Then we meet our heroes, fiercely independent, nomadic and beautiful American surfer Zephyr (Hassie Harrison) and stunningly handsome and good-natured local guy Moses (Josh Heuston). They bond over Creedence Clearwater Revival and Point Break and spend the night together. But when Zephyr goes surfing at dawn, Tucker, a tireless predator, captures her and she wakes, bound, in the bowels of his boat. Fortunately, Moses starts looking for her…
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Jai Courtney is superb as a kind of satanic version of Steve Irwin, jocular, sententious and insane. He even performs a psychotic, drunken dance, just like Jame Gumb's in The Silence of the Lambs. He's delighted to discover that Zephyr is a fighter. 'I love fighters,' he says.
Dangerous Animals develops into an efficient survival thriller at sea, the action properly staged rather than relying entirely on fast edits and jump cuts, even though there are a few too many fake-outs, escapes and recaptures. It's no match for Thomas Harris's vision of universal predation ('His own modest predations paled beside those of God, who is in irony matchless, and in wanton malice beyond measure,' Hannibal Lecter believes). But Dangerous Animals is a handy updating of Wolf Creek, that warning to Brits not to trust characterful Aussies. Shark films have always had the proviso that there's nothing to worry about if you avoid the water. Aussie horrors like these might leave you thinking much the same about that entire continent.
'Dangerous Animals' is in cinemas now
[See also: Wes Anderson's sense of an ending]
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I do signings. They fly me all over the world and pay me in cash at those things - around £10,000 a time. "There are Jaws tours and people pay double if I'm on them and next month I'm appearing at three Meet, Greet and Mingle Parties. "I still get paid every time the film appears on TV. My brother lives in Portugal and I'll get texts from him going: 'good news, you just died on TV over here. You'll get another cheque.'". Until recently, Jeffrey was running a restaurant where he sold Alex Kintner burgers and fans would pay him to record personal Cameo videos. He shares: "I did one yesterday from the beach where I died and said: 'Hey! From your dear wife and the dead Alex Kintner – happy birthday!''People seem to enjoy it, although I had a peculiar request last year. A family contacted me and said: 'our father was a big Jaws fan and he passed away on the couch watching the film, can you send your condolences.'"I thought: 'what on earth is this? ' But I decided I'd do it and went down to the beach to record it. ""I said: 'hey, your father and I had a little something in common. He passed away watching me die. This is the deceased Alex Kintner, Jeff Voorhees, here on Martha's Vineyard – Amity Island. Just want to say – have a Jawesome funeral. '""I thought they'd be upset, but they gave me a five star review. '""At first, I used to shy away from the fact that I'd been in Jaws and then finally I realised I could earn some decent money and make people happy. "Released in June 1975 and based on the Peter Benchley novel, Jaws was an immediate blockbuster. The story of a terrifying man-eating great white shark, it caused a significant decrease in beach attendances rapidly became the highest-grossing film ever. Almost a third of America's population rushed to the cinema to see it - more than 67 million people - and an audience of 23m tuned in when it was shown for the first time on UK television in 1981. Jeffrey reminisced on his iconic role as the shark's second and youngest victim in the blockbuster hit Jaws, where the sound of his character being dragged underwater left audiences horrified as the torn remains of a yellow inflatable washed up on sheer chance, he stumbled upon the role after just signing up to be an extra, but soon found himself acting alongside titans of the silver screen like Steven Spielberg, who was directing one of his early major films, and stars Richard Dreyfuss (marine biologist Matt Hooper) and Robert Shaw (shark hunter Quint).Yet, Jeffrey recollects that the notorious drinker Robert Shaw was far from pleased to be performing with children." Spielberg felt bad for all the kids because we were freezing cold and he set up some cook-outs and baseball games, so we'd be out there playing baseball with Richard Dreyfuss. ""Robert Shaw would be sitting over by the fire, far away from everyone. We were just little kids and we went: 'oh, let's go say hello to him. '""We all ran up and he sounded just like he did in the movie. We could smell booze and he went: 'get away from me you little s***s! ' He wanted nothing to do with us! "The iconic film, set in the made-up Amity Island beach resort, saw its production on Martha's Vineyard, which is still home to Jeffrey, and he mentions the buzz around town at the time." We heard rumours that they were making a movie and were paying $40 a day to be an extra," Jeffrey recalls." We all signed up and then a few days later I was called in by Steven Spielberg, who asked me to read a few lines and then made me sign a ton of papers. ""He said I was joining the Screen Actors Guild because I'd got a speaking part and was going to be paid $140 a day. That's pretty good when you're 12 years old. "Initially, Alex's death scene involved a dummy filled with fake blood and organs which the shark tore Jaws team even added screams and the sound of bones crushing to make it as horrifying as possible, but when the scene was shown at a test screening in 1975, filmgoers fainted and threw says: "It was too hardcore. So, they changed it and asked me to swim out to a barrel filled with blood. ""They said: 'lie on top of it and when it explodes in the air go under the water and stay under for as long as you can. '""Spielberg was only 27 and he wanted everything perfect, so he went: 'your arm came out of the water, we've got to do it again. '""We had to wait seven hours for the blood to clear out of the water before we could try again. We did it again and this time my leg came out of the water. ""Five days later he said: 'right ok, this is getting too long. We've got two guys in wetsuits and this time when it explodes, they'll each grab a leg and lift you in and out of the water a few times. They're then going to pull you under and give you air. '"One guy in England just bought 125 photos. I do signings. They fly me all over the world and pay me in cash at those things - around £10,000 a time." People always say: 'were you afraid of the shark? I'm like: 'no, I was afraid of freezing my 12 year-old ass off! '"After starring in 'Jaws', Jeffrey turned to the world of TV with a role in the hit American series 'Santa Barbara' and the movie 'One More Shot', before taking a different path as a seafood restaurant hung up his managerial apron last year, yet his 'Jaws' legacy endures, keeping him in the spotlight. Recalling a fan encounter, Jeffrey says: "I went to a fan convention in Manchester a few years ago. There was a man who'd been waiting there since 2am and had Jaws tattoos all over him. He said he had one spot left and asked me to sign inside the shark's mouth. He then went off to get my autograph tattooed there permanently. "Even as the film celebrates its fiftieth anniversary, the chilling impact of 'Jaws' lives on. Describing family reactions, Jeffrey remarks: "My nephew watched Jaws when he was ten. We went to the water a couple of weeks later and he said: 'I'm not going in there; I don't want to be eaten by a shark. ' He wouldn't go in the sea for a whole summer!"
