Sean Byrne never does anything halfway. The visionary director excels at creating visceral nightmares that twist audience expectations through familiar terrain. His 2009 debut The Loved Ones is a sadistic exploration of the teen slasher film while 2015’s The Devil’s Candy is a metal-tinged deconstruction of satanic possession. Byrne’s latest feature, Dangerous Animals, tackles the shark horror genre by suggesting that there may be more sinister killers floating on the ocean’s surface. Bruce Tucker (Jai Courtney) is a surfer and shark diver who uses his ocean tourism business as a front to lure victims into his own deadly jaws. Byrne’s stories may have little in common, but each of his three feature films center iconic villains who command the screen with evil intent while horrifying us with their extreme acts of violence delivered through a gory explosion of color and sound.
The Loved Ones follows Lola Stone (Robin McLeavy), a seemingly innocent teenage girl who’s rage is awakened when Brent (Xavier Samuel) rejects her invitation to an upcoming dance. Though he kindly explains that he already has a date, Lola sends her stoic Daddy (John Brumpton) to abduct the young man and bring him back to their house for a nightmarish approximation of the seminal event. Bound to a chair, Brent is tortured and taunted throughout the night before Lola attempts to perform a homemade power drill lobotomy. She plans to add Brent to her growing number of “frogs” living in a body-strewn pit beneath her living room floor.
Byrne’s next villain, Ray Smilie (Pruitt Taylor Vince), is more reluctant to kill but his gruesome methods are equally disturbing. Tormented by whispers from the devil himself, Ray is compelled to feed innocent children to this dark deity. After smashing his young victims’ skulls with a rock, he wraps them in duct tape and leaves them to languish in a hotel bathroom. We hear muffled screams coming from just out of sight while the quiet man methodically dons a makeshift butcher’s apron. Listening to dated religious video tapes, Ray dismembers the screaming children then buries their bodies in his rural side yard.
Using the freedom of the open sea, Tucker’s own brand of evil hides in plain sight. As the captain of a shark diving boat, he advertises up close and personal encounters with the ocean’s most deadly predators. But he’s rigged protective equipment to reverse its purpose and place human captives directly in harm’s way. Rather than observing sharks in their natural habitat, Tucker’s clients become the show’s main attraction, starring in his sadistic home version of a shark horror film. Though their methods differ wildly, Lola, Ray, and Tucker each challenge societal taboos in their own brutal ways. Byrne leans into shocking acts of ruthless violence, daring audiences to stomach each scene while allowing none of his characters to emerge unscathed.
In addition to their merciless cruelty, each villain pops with vibrant color matching the artistry of their bloodshed. To prepare for her nightmarish dance, Lola dons a pink, satiny dress that perfectly reflects her obsession with stereotypical femininity. But rather than a soft bubblegum hue, she chooses a deep electric pink, perfectly complimenting the extremity of her rage. Lola enhances this deceptive energy with her own brand of brutal art. She marks her territory by “drawing” on Brent, using a fork to carve her initials and a large heart into his chest.
While The Loved Ones exists as a hot pink fantasy of terror, The Devil’s Candy swims in garish red. Recently released from a mental institution, we meet Ray in a crimson track suit matching the red stained glass cross emblazoned on the door to his home. The outside world seems saturated in blood when viewed through this disturbing window. The house’s next occupant is a struggling artist named Jesse (Ethan Embry) who also hears sinister whispers emerging from the walls. Transfixed by the devil’s gravelly voice, he brings Ray’s grisly crimes to life in a disturbing portrait of victims past and future. Bright red paint aligns with copious blood as Ray’s young sacrifice is reborn on Jesse’s canvas as a screaming wraith trapped under the devil’s dark eye.
Tucker takes stylish inspiration from the scene of his crimes. The murderous boatman wears a series of blue workman’s shirts—and one memorable bathrobe—that mirror the ocean depths where his monsters swim. Rather than a visual artist, Tucker sees himself as a director of sorts. He obsesses over putting on the show of a lifetime and films each of his victims as they’re eaten alive, adding the tapes to his ever growing library of carnage. Though each villain has their own signature color, their iconic clothes will be covered in blood by their story’s finale as they each fall victim to their own dangerous obsessions.
Though awash with brilliant hues, Byrne’s films overflow with songs perfectly calibrated to reflect his killers’ inner desires. The Loved Ones has become nearly synonymous with Kasey Chambers’ “Not Pretty Enough” which plays on heavy rotation throughout the film. This tender teen ballad channels Lola’s fears of inadequacy wrapped in the guise of romantic desire. But contrary to the song’s lamentable lyrics, she is not a delicate flower in need of validation, but a gruesome murderer raging at patriarchal limitations.
Tucker similarly fixates on Stevie Wright’s liberating anthem “Evie, Part 1” while preparing for his violent ritual. Scantily clad and unhinged, he dances on the deck of his deadly abode while his would-be victim Zephyr (Hassie Harrison) adopts Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Ooby Dooby” to find her own salvation. The Devil’s Candy may not have a signature song, but the film itself could be viewed as a love letter to heavy metal music. We first meet Ray playing his Flying V guitar as loud as he can in order to drown out the devil’s voice. This abrasive and often maligned musical genre forms the bond through which Jesse finds his own strength and forms an emotional connection with his imperiled daughter.
Though each of his films explores an element of our pop culture lives, Byrne is always careful to keep the villainy where it belongs. Lola may see Brent as a representation of the dehumanizing objectification thrust onto teen girls, but we see a sensitive and kind young man struggling with trauma of his own. Tucker uses sharks as weapons of murder, but Byrne reminds us that they are majestic and often gentle creatures simply hunting for food. Heavy metal music is not a channel for the devil’s voice, but a method to drown out his compelling commands and an empowering vessel for Jesse’s intuition. Byrne has created three iconic villains who use the trappings of pop culture in their murderous artistry creating rich tapestries of violence and gore.
Dangerous Animals is now playing in theaters nationwide. Get tickets now!
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