Latest news with #HassieHarrison
News24
14-06-2025
- Entertainment
- News24
Sharks, survival, and serial killers: Behind the scenes of Dangerous Animals
Hassie Harrison stars alongside Josh Heuston in Dangerous Animals, a genre-blending survival horror set on Australia's Gold Coast. The film follows a troubled surfer's fight for survival after being abducted by a shark-obsessed serial killer. In this Q&A, Harrison and Heuston discuss chemistry, high-stakes stunts, and exploring complex themes in their roles. Yellowstone actor Hassie Harrison stars in the Australian survival horror film Dangerous Animals. Directed by Sean Byrne, the film follows Zephyr (Harrison), a solitary surfer with a troubled past who has come to Australia's Gold Coast to find an escape. Her peaceful existence is disrupted when she meets Moses (Josh Heuston), a local real estate agent and fellow surfer. After a romantic night with him, she flees to the ocean but is abducted by Tucker (Jai Courtney), a shark-obsessed serial killer. The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival during the Directors' Fortnight section and received various reviews. Courtney was lauded for his performance, with many calling Tucker one of the best new horror villains, while Byrne's direction was praised for blending serial-killer thriller with a 'creature feature,' delivering tension and slick production quality. In this Q&A, Harrison and Heuston discuss their roles in Dangerous Animals. From building instant chemistry to navigating thrilling stunts and blending complex themes, they share behind-the-scenes insights. You both create a believable connection in such a short time, which drives the action for the audience. We understand why these two people now have something to fight for and live for. How did you work with Sean to establish that relationship? Josh Heuston: Sean, first of all, had it all mapped out, every single moment and beat. He had hand-drawn sketches for everything, so every day he comes to set, he already has the entire shot just mapped out for you. So there's that. But then, in terms of building a connection, we just clicked instantly. Hassie Harrison: We did a chemistry read before, and just have always had each other's backs and championed each other. JH: Hassie already booked the role, and I dropped a line in the chemistry read, and then Hassie was like, 'Oh, that was my bad', and pretended that she made a mistake to help me get over the nerves. I messed up the audition for a moment, and she had my back and saved me. HH: I had his back since day one. It's actually kind of funny, too – when we did the movie, our whole first week was just our opening love story. So when we first started the movie, it felt like I was doing a rom-com. It was just so easy, fun and light, and then all of a sudden, we had to switch gears. Courtesy of Independent Film Company and Shudder Dangerous Animals is such a fantastic mash of genres; it's a shark thriller, but it has the serial killer element added. What did you enjoy about having that blend of genres? HH: It's always cool to be able to bend genres because I feel like it's more representative of how complex life is. It's more than just one note. JH: For me, it was my first time stepping into thriller or horror, so it was just exciting. In certain dramas or sci-fi stuff that I've done before, the stakes aren't always 110%, whereas [in this], we're kind of all fighting for our lives. It was very exciting and fun; you're not usually screaming and running away or fighting a bear of a man - you're not doing that in other genres. It was a learning experience, but at the same time, it was just insanely fun. You both get to do stunt, fighting and combat work. What did you enjoy about the practicality of blocking that all out? HH: To be honest, it really inspired me; I want my next job to have a lot more stunts and stuff like that. I'm luckily a very physically capable person, and it adds this whole other fun element of choreography to the acting. It's just fun; you feel that adrenaline, just like you hope the audience does. JH: For me, I came into it being like, I want to do every single stunt I can, and I didn't want to have to use a stuntman too much. I loved it, but if you asked me in 20, 30 years, I'd probably be like, 'Someone else can do it'. It's physically demanding, but at the same time, this movie was just so much fun to make from day one through to the last day. Jai has spoken about how there were moments on set where you've got actors strung up in Tucker's feeding harness and how he felt the intensity and the weight of that in playing the villain. How did you both decompress from the darker elements of the story? JH: To be honest, after the harness scene, I went and got a massage. I was like, 'my body's not working the way it used to'. But I loved having Jai opposite me; he's feeding me the entire time. So it's so easy to fall into that. HH: It took me a little time to shake it, I'll be honest. I started having nightmares and stuff. Honestly, for me, just being on the beach, and we got to shoot on the Gold Coast – I would just go get in the ocean every day and wash it off. Courtesy of Mark Taylor. You're shooting much of the film on a boat, on location – what was that experience like, out on the water? JH: I grew up in Australia, so I'm used to being out there. I love the ocean, and I grew up with it - grew up surfing and doing all that sort of stuff. But I'm not a very good surfer, that being said. HH: You're great! That's what everybody says. JH: For me, I'm happiest near the ocean. So it was like a holiday, but just doing something I love at the same time. A lot of the tension and the horror in Dangerous Animals comes from the stillness that Sean Byrne employs, as much as he uses fast-paced moments. How did that manifest on set? JH: He's a very visceral director, so he knows exactly what he wants, and he's in the scene with you. We had a running joke, which was 'gritted teeth'. So a lot of his direction was 'gritted teeth, we need the gritted teeth', and we're all trying to deliver that. But he's heavy breathing and tense and fighting with us while we're in these same scenes. He's acting just as much as we are in the entire process. Which, for me, gave so, so much support. HH: Essentially, he's great at building tension. It's not like there's this overuse of gore just for gore's sake. There are these earned moments, and it builds up and then has a release. And that's what makes the ride so fun. The story contrasts humans as social animals against solitary sharks, but also against Tucker, this man who's isolated himself from the world because of the pain he's experienced. How did those themes resonate for you? JH: Moses' heart is on his sleeve, and he leads with that. For me, it was always trying to find the connection with Hassie, and that's my throughline throughout the entire film. He's just trying to follow this connection. It was a 12-hour experience of them hanging out, but for him, it was such an important moment in his life, and he just followed that. So, in terms of isolation, Moses is not trying to isolate himself at all. He's just trying to follow the love of his life in that moment, and it gave me something to fight for. HH: Zephyr is fighting what she feels and knows is real love, and the fact that she hasn't known a lot of kindness in her life, has her walls built up and has created a life that can match the level of intimacy she can handle. And then there's that mirror; as soon as she meets Josh's character, all of that is brought up to the surface, and she's like: 'Wait'. She's just a scared pup, a hurt pup. Courtesy of Independent Film Company and Shudder. We get some clues as to the reasons she feels isolated from the world. How did you understand Zephyr's mindset coming to Australia? HH: A big part of what informed a lot of my research, and it's not even touched on in the film really, but there's a tattoo that she has on her back that actually is a universal symbol for sexual abuse. And that's a big part of why she has closed up and run away and has become this vagabond. It's a really hard and truthful topic, and doing the research on that was heavy, but that's what was real for her. Australian horror is known for its particular brutality, and that's matched in this film with some fairly brutal moments – like a character biting their own thumb off. As an American, what was your sort of understanding of the Australian horror genre? HH: Australians are so well respected in this space. Between The Loved Ones and The Devil's Candy, Sean knows his stuff when it comes to all things genre. I love my Aussies, but you guys do seem to have a little dark, wicked side. But I was down to come play, and I knew I had big shoes to fill. [To Josh] Was I the only American on set? JH: Yeah, pretty much. Hassie showed up, ready to rock from day one. There were no reservations of jumping into the Australian culture- HH: And ocean. JH: Literally. There was no hesitation; she jumped straight in. I guess Australians are known for a bit of grit, like Wolf Creek, one of our cult classic Australian horror films. Recently, there's Talk to Me, which is amazing. Australia's on a wave right now, I think, with horror, and Hassie came and brought it and drove it as well. It's great seeing Australia kind of rock it in horror. Courtesy of Independent Film Company and Shudder Okay, let's finish on Zephyr biting off her own thumb to escape. What I loved about the thumb is how it wasn't just like this incredible act of bravery, but it matched thematically – the whole idea of a bear gnawing its way out of a trap. What was it like shooting that? HH: I was actually the most nervous about that scene. Of course, they saved it for the very last day, and everybody's trying to have this super cool last day, all partying together; summer camp's over. I think one of the things that was important for me to feel was her vulnerability and how scared she was to do it; you know what I mean? That was a hard scene to shoot. I kind of hyperventilated. JH: She passed out. HH: Yeah, I passed out. JH: The stakes are so high for you, too, like I'm still covered in blood across the room from you and trying to be present as much as possible. But yeah, you if you're like, because you are hyperventilating in a way, to try and get yourself to that emotional state, and Hassie, again, committed 100% and passed the f*** out. HH: I'll never forget. I just started, like, slowly tipping. And our DP was like, 'Hey!' and came and caught me. It's one of those scenes that you just have to commit to, and it looks so rank. I couldn't believe, watching it in the theatre, how everyone was cheering. I was like, 'Yeah, okay, all right!'
The Guardian
14-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Dangerous Animals review – serial killer meets shark movie in this formulaic fizzer
For a long time, serial killer and shark movies were separate forms of cinema; never the twain did meet. In Dangerous Animals they've been blended into one foul fishy stew, theoretically delivering the best of both worlds: a Wolf Creekian adventure with a creature feature twist. But, sadly, this collision of genres hasn't resulted in any real freshness or flair, playing out with a stinky waft of the familiar. Jai Courtney gets the meatiest and most entertaining role as Tucker, the owner of a Gold Coast business that ferries thrill-seekers out into shark-infested waters, where they observe the great beasts from inside an underwater cage. After they're hauled back on to the boat, Tucker kills them and feeds them to the sharks, while filming their grisly deaths on a camcorder for his personal collection of VHS snuff films. The director, Sean Byrne (who previously helmed two more impressive horror movies: The Devil's Candy and The Loved Ones), doesn't follow the Jaws approach of making us wait to see the villain. Tucker appears in the first scene, even before the person who'll challenge and perhaps even defeat him: the free-spirited US surfer and vagabond Zephyr (Hassie Harrison). Her strategy of dealing with locals seems to be avoiding them – and who could blame her? Perhaps she's seen Wake in Fright, Welcome to Woop Woop, Wolf Creek, The Surfer or any of the zillion other Aussie films in which foreigners get flayed by life down under. Sign up for the fun stuff with our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morning 'There was nothing for me on land,' Zephyr tells a young man, Moses (Josh Heuston), when he asks why she got into surfing. The point is stressed that she's a solo operator and no pushover – but, once kidnapped by Tucker, Zephyr doesn't have a lot to work with, being chained and immobile for much of the movie. Dangerous Animals is quite sharply made, and for a while I was with it, enjoying the midnight-movie vibes. But its adherence to formula and sheer predictability stifle the fun. From early on Moses's trajectory is obvious: he'll be the only person who notices that Zephyr is missing, goes searching for her and plays a role in the final act. It's also clear that if Zephyr defeats the villain (partly a question of whether the producers envision sequels) it'll only be after a few failed escape attempts. Sometimes the dialogue feels prefabricated: after Tucker tells Zephyr she's 'hard as nails, like me', you just know the protagonist will issue a curt rejection (she fires back: 'I'm nothing like you!'). And moments that should pop don't quite land. A scene in which Tucker coaxes a couple of tourists into a rendition of Baby Shark could have been legendarily strange and meme-able, comparable perhaps to a sledgehammer-wielding Nicolas Cage singing the Hokey Pokey in Mom and Dad; instead it falls flat. Moments with the villain monologising fare a little better. The first occurs when Tucker recounts how, as a child, being bitten by a great white resulted in a quasi-religious experience: 'I've been wide awake ever since,' he says, like a crew member on the Nebuchadnezzar. Later he argues that sea predators protect the fabric of the universe: 'The shark brings order and, without this, chaos reigns.' This dude really likes sharks. It's a funny thing to want a villain to be more hammy, especially when the performance is as good as Courtney's (as his foil, Harrison is also strong, albeit in a blander role). But I did crave more scenery-chewing, more flamboyance, more chutzpah – anything to free Dangerous Animals from the straitjacket of formula. Dangerous Animals is in cinemas now
The Review Geek
08-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Review Geek
Dangerous Animals (2025) Movie Review – A bloody good time
A bloody good time There's an art to crafting a great trailer that doesn't spoil everything, and Dangerous Animals' teaser is almost pitch-perfect in that regard. It's gripping, intriguing, and captures the essence of this horror/thriller beautifully. Clocking in at just over 90 minutes, Dangerous Animals provides little surprises, living up to the promise produced in that teaser and embracing its distilled B-movie greatness. It's a film that's unashamedly visceral and gory, but also surprisingly effective in execution. The story draws inspiration from 10 Cloverfield Lane and Jaws, blending those influences into a lean teen horror in the vein of Don't Breathe and Hush. The opening of Dangerous Animals sets the scene for the film to follow. Mysterious, tense and just a tad surreally funny – Bruce Tucker (played to perfection by Jai Courtney) – runs a shark-diving expedition on his boat. Unfortunately, it all goes wrong for tourist Heather when her boyfriend is killed and fed to the sharks, while she's abducted by this maniacal serial killer. With Bruce on the hunt for new victims, he sets his sights on survivalist Zephyr (Hassie Harrison), a savvy and free-spirited young surfer. When she crosses paths with Bruce, Zephyr is forced to try and survive, doing everything she can to overcome this maniacal predator. With the stakes raised, Zephyr is handcuffed in the depths of Tucker's fishing boat, while he circles the water like a hungry shark, looking for tasty spots to pick up prey. Zephyr will be the next in line to meet a sticky demise though – unless she can outsmart him. The story is simplistic and rather predictable but the performances from both Jai Courtney and Hassie Harrison help this one stand out. The pair work hard to outshine one another, with Courtney's monologues about the ocean, animal hierarchies and predators both chilling and strangely educational. Courtney has an intoxicating way of filling every scene with an eerie sense of dread, and the movie is all the stronger for lingering the camera on him for an uncomfortably long time. Conversely, Harrison's portrayal of Zephyr – a spunky, tough-as-nails survivor – makes for an easy heroine to root for, especially as the movie examines a bit of her backstory and what drives her. There's no big exposition dumps or overlong explanations about the past though, with Sean Byrne instead letting audiences make draw their own conclusions. One of the standout scenes involves no dialogue at all: Bruce silently eating dinner, the camera lingering uncomfortably long. It's incredibly effective and underscores just how far gone he is. All of this is helped by the way Dangerous Animals effectively builds dread with just the right amount of hard cuts and lingering shots. The editors have done a great job here cutting the film together, clearly knowing when to cut away—and when not to. The film's main antagonistic hook (no pun intended) actually stems from Tucker rather than the sharks. These marine predators are used sparingly but effectively enough to maintain their presence as a formidable foe. However, the movie does a good job of portraying them as actual animals rather than maniacal killing machines too ala. Jaws. It's one of the more unique and welcome aspects of this movie that should definitely be applauded Having said that though, Dangerous Animals overplays its hand on several occasions. The movie attempts one too many break-out attempts for Zephyr and it diminishes their impact over time. It's also worth noting too that Moses Markley (Josh Heuston) is embarrassingly underused here. He doesn't have a whole lot to do beyond some filler investigative work to keep him busy, and the material he is given when joined with Zephyr has him playing second fiddle to her character. Moses lacks agency or anything in the way of charisma, which is a shame because this unrealized potential is a big hindrance to what's otherwise a taut thriller. Overall, Dangerous Animals is a decent, if unremarkable, thriller. It doesn't break new ground, and the plot has few surprises, but the strong lead performances and slick editing keep things afloat. Flaws and all, this one's still a bloody good time. Read More: Dangerous Animals Ending Explained
Toronto Sun
06-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Toronto Sun
REVIEW: ‘Jaws' meets ‘Silence of the Lambs' in ‘Dangerous Animals'
Published Jun 06, 2025 • 3 minute read Hassie Harrison in "Dangerous Animals." Photo by Courtesy of Mark Taylor / IFC Film Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected. Postmedia may earn an affiliate commission from purchases made through links on this page. Half a century after Steven Spielberg's 'Jaws' stirred fear and fascination by painting sharks as bloodthirsty monsters of the sea, the tongue-in-cheek horror thriller 'Dangerous Animals' gets its kicks watching a predator in cargo shorts and flip-flops – not one with a dorsal fin and sharp teeth – toying with his prey. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. THIS CONTENT IS RESERVED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Toronto Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. SUBSCRIBE TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Toronto Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. REGISTER / SIGN IN TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account. Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments. Enjoy additional articles per month. Get email updates from your favourite authors. THIS ARTICLE IS FREE TO READ REGISTER TO UNLOCK. Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments Enjoy additional articles per month Get email updates from your favourite authors Don't have an account? Create Account In a sharksploitation subgenre teeming with ridiculous premises (see: 'Ouija Shark,' 'Cocaine Shark,' etc.) and plenty of atrocious CGI, this vicious little Australian import is a breath of fresh oxygen. Lean, mean and bloody, director Sean Byrne's latest (he made 'The Devil's Candy') finds a fresh way into the annals of survival horror by pitting surfer vs. serial killer on the open seas, and as a corrective of sorts to the 'Jaws effect.' Here, it's not the carnivorous fishies its heroine should be worried about, but the sociopath with a misogynist streak trawling nearby waters. Hassie Harrison ('Yellowstone') stars as Zephyr, an itinerant American surfer in Australia who gets cold feet after a meet-cute with sensitive real estate agent Moses (Josh Heuston, stretching a thin role far enough to sell the connection). Ditching him after a passionate night together, she crosses paths with a stranger only to awake handcuffed in the bowels of a boat at sea in a nightmare scenario straight out of 'Saw.' Like February's slasher mash-up 'Heart Eyes,' 'Dangerous Animals' uses rom-com conventions to raise the stakes: Can this guarded loner escape a serial killer so she can learn to let down her walls and un-ghost her maybe-soulmate? Your noon-hour look at what's happening in Toronto and beyond. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. Please try again This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Not if her captor can help it. Played with nutty aplomb by Jai Courtney, Bruce Tucker (Bruce being the nickname given to the mechanical shark in 'Jaws,' one of this movie's many homages) is a local charter boat captain and diving guide who's made a hobby of kidnapping female tourists and using them as chum for his own twisted VHS snuff movies. Sunburned and sadistic, Tucker fancies himself an apex predator. After surviving a childhood great white attack, with the gnarly scars to prove it, he knows how to weaponize that down-under charm to disarm his unsuspecting victims, even if he mostly relies on sharks to do his killing. Byrne wisely unleashes Courtney whenever possible, starting with a playful but foreboding prologue when meek English student Heather (Ella Newton) and her arrogant hostel hookup (Liam Greinke) arrive at Tucker's dock seeking oceanic thrills. Capturing sunbaked postcard hues along Queensland's Gold Coast and the eerie glow of Tucker's ramshackle boat by night, cinematographer Shelley Farthing-Dawe turns ocean vistas from bright and welcoming to portentous in the blink of a sunset, and gives underwater scenes featuring footage of real sharks an unnerving sense of gravity and grace. Horror and humor go hand in hand throughout as Tucker and Zephyr face off and Moses valiantly attempts to find her, though an intermittently screechy score overplays tense moments to the point of distraction. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Courtney's beastly performance remains the main attraction, electric whether he's crooning 'Baby Shark,' casually slicing jugulars or showing off drunken dance moves in his underwear a la Buffalo Bill in 'The Silence of the Lambs.' And he's quietly chilling as he explains his impulse to subjugate 'weaker creatures' in the name of order. Still, it's Harrison who carries the movie with steeliness and smarts. The film hints at common childhood wounds that sent predator and prey – or is it predator and predator? – on different paths of survival, but it doesn't probe very deeply, instead more interested in putting Zephyr through her gory final-girl paces. As her attempts at escape turn repetitious, the script by Nick Lepard never quite figures out how to fill its 98-minute run time with new cat-and-mouse (or shark-and-marlin, as Tucker dubs her) twists, and 'Dangerous Animals' loses steam treading familiar trope-filled waters en route to an oddly mawkish ending. At least it knows not to take itself too seriously – even if it did have its world premiere at the recent Cannes Film Festival's Directors' Fortnight. Spielberg's shark movie crown is still safe for the moment, even if the waters still aren't. Happy summer. – – – Two and one-half stars. Rated R. At theatres. Contains grisly violence, language, sex, drugs and sharks. 98 minutes. Rating guide: Four stars masterpiece, three stars very good, two stars OK, one star poor, no stars waste of time. Olympics NHL Toronto & GTA Editorial Cartoons Ontario
Forbes
06-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
Jai Courtney On ‘Dangerous Animals' And Missing Out On ‘Jack Reacher'
Jai Courtney attends the Los Angeles premiere of 'Dangerous Animals' at the Egyptian theatre in ... More Hollywood, California. If Dangerous Animals actor Jai Courtney has learned anything in his career, it's never to let a character's death stand in the way of a potential franchise. "I'll get quoted, so I've got to be careful here because I've put my foot in it in the past when it comes to characters returning," the Australian says with a laugh. "As a great director once told me, in this kind of world, you can break all the rules that you establish. Sequels, prequels, who knows? The important thing is that I had fun with this character. If someone wants to do it again, I'm fu**king there." The American-Australian survival horror film sees Courtney play Tucker, a shark-obsessed serial killer who kidnaps people, holds them captive on his boat, and then feeds them to the deadly predators, videotaping their gory demises. However, he meets his match when he abducts a rebellious surfer called Zephyr, played by Yellowstone's Hassie Harrison. R-rated Dangerous Animals lands exclusively in theaters on Friday, June 6, 2025. While Tucker appears to be out of the picture, his reign of terror might not be over. "He could be part of a larger group of psychos," the actor muses. "It could be the beginning of a long-running series where we explore one tape in every episode. The sky's the limit." Courtney's killer is the latest solid entry in a lineage of heinous killers in Australian horror and is arguably the best since John Jarratt's Mick Taylor in Wolf Creek. However, they're different beasts. "There are easy comparisons to make in that you're dealing with an Aussie serial killer and characters that fall into that web. That's where, thematically, the bad marriage ends," Courtney muses. "I guess there's some familiar territory between the two. Wolf Creek made a splash when it was released, and I think it opened up a world that people were perhaps aware of, but it was familiar and terrifying. It was enough to scare people from driving across the Nullarbor Plain in Australia or wherever it is. Dangerous Animals will probably have a similar impact. Wolf Creek has achieved contemporary iconic status, so if people enjoy this enough to group it in with that in years to come, that's something to be proud of." Similar to British bad guys in movies, an Aussie villain has a certain quality that sets them apart from American psychopaths. The Suicide Squad and Terminator Genisys actor acknowledges this and leans into it but can't quite put his finger on what the difference is. "I feel like it's something that we did just breaks the mold," he says. "When you're looking at it through a lens from America, there's a certain level of intrigue around it. We are countries with a rich history that isn't necessarily widely understood in this part of the world. Australia is synonymous with all kinds of dangerous, creepy crawlies." "The number of times I speak to someone, and they're like, 'I always wanted to go to Australia, but the flights are too long, and doesn't everything they want to kill you?' Maybe something about Dangerous Animals leans into that a little further than people want it to, but it's taking something that people want to know, and it's just far enough away from their reality that it elevates the threat." Jai Courtney in 'Dangerous Animals.' Dangerous Animals is only the third movie from director Sean Byrne, and it's the first he has filmed that he didn't write. Something that appealed to Courtney was the fact the filmmaker likes to "mash stuff up" when it comes to genre movies and "has an attachment to certain themes." "He's very musical," the actor explains. "He has an enormous appreciation for needle drops within things. I liked his work. I saw The Loved Ones when it was released years ago, and then I watched The Devil's Candy in reference to meeting him and discussing this, and I think he's an adventurous filmmaker. He really understands story, temperature, and volume when it comes to this genre. It's not a space I've played in before, so to work with someone who gets that was comforting; I had to lean on him for a lot of that because style changes when you're dealing with all the elements that will feed into the atmosphere you're going to build when you watch a movie, particularly in this world." "I urge people to see this in a cinema because our sound design is so huge. The experience of being out on the water, with all that industrial material clanging and banging, adds up to a visceral experience and the threat we're dealing with. You've got to adapt to a little bit of that when you're when you're performing, and it's hard to do. Having someone in the driver's seat who you know has confidence in knowing when to dial things up or down was really beneficial. It was a story he wanted to tell. Sean is such a sweetheart and is so easy to work with and collaborate with. It was also an element of coming into this and saying, 'Let me do what I want to do with it.' He's prescriptive in some ways and also very trusting. He knew I had an understanding of Tucker, even though it wasn't territory I'd ever played in before. There was something that I felt was necessary for this to work, and he allowed me to do that." A great example of that is a scene where Tucker, slightly drunk and high on a cocktail of mayhem and toxic masculinity, dances in his underwear to classic rock. There's a sexual vibe to the scene that gives off strong Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs and was a sequence created specifically for Courtney. "Sean told me the other night that apparently they wrote that in to send me the script. I don't recall the exact quote, but Troy Lum, one of our producers, mentioned that actors enjoy having a moment where they're behind the curtain. They were trying to find a beat that felt completely self-indulgent yet distinct from the performance. Tucker is a very performative character with everyone, and he's this guy who loves the sound of his own voice. I think the dance intended to give him space to have a party on his own. We don't see a lot of that because we're with him and another character for most of the movie in some way or another. It was out of my comfort zone and completely unrehearsed and unchoreographed. It was just me, Shelley Farthing-Dawe, our director of photography and the camera operator. He got in there handheld, in that sort of galley in Tucker's kitchen, and he's having a little party. We just went for it. We cranked up the old Aussie anthem, Evie by Stevie Wright, and blasted it twice in a row, and that was that. We all went home." Jai Courtney in 'Dangerous Animals.' Next on Courtney's schedule after Dangerous Animals is War Machine, which he also shot in his native Australia. Not much is known about Netflix's science fiction action film, in which he co-stars with, among others, Alan Ritchson, best known for his titular lead role in Prime Video's hit Jack Reacher TV show. Courtney, of course, starred in the 2012 Jack Reacher movie headlined by Tom Cruise and had his eye on a return to the Reacherverse via the small screen. "I've seen the show, and I remember when that was casting, I was like, 'Wait, I'm big enough to play Jack Reacher,' and they were like, 'No, that's too close to home,' which was a bummer at the time," he laughs. "I never got to look in." "Alan's great in that, and he's great in War Machine. I admire that dude and what he's doing. It's weirdly cool to see big, burly blokes getting roles because there was such a fear for a while. I know we've always had iconic action stars with certain physiques, but as someone who's not small, it's nice to see dudes in dramatic roles who aren't getting pigeonholed so much. He's getting a chance to do that with a lot of the work he's setting up, so props to him," the Dangerous Animals actor concludes. "I can't wait to see how that movie does."
