‘Under Paris’ Review: At Last, a Shark Movie Worthy of Swimming in the Wake of ‘Jaws’
variety.comMichael Nordine “What if there were a shark in the Seine?” is, one can only assume, a question that Parisians ponder on a daily basis.
It’s also brilliant in its simplicity, if not quite as appealingly silly a high-concept premise as “what if there were snakes on a plane?” and “what if the moon … fell?” Look no further than “Under Paris” for an answer to the hypothetical that surely keeps Emmanuel Macron up at night, as Netflix’s new thriller swims rather than sinks as it adds life to a genre that’s been bloodless for far too long.
Most importantly, director Xavier Gens (“Lupin”) plays it straight — there’s no winking at the crowd or so-bad-it’s-good posturing, just killer set-pieces and a firm understanding of the fact that the best creature features are those in which you see the creature as little as possible.
In much the same way that Godzilla was driven to his city-destroying ways by radiation-emitting nuclear tests, Lilith (as our apex-predator antagonist is somewhat endearingly known) seeks refuge in France’s iconic river after pollution drives her out of her saltwater home. “Under Paris” makes its environmental underpinnings clear in the opening sequence: a trip to the depressingly vast Great Pacific Garbage Patch in which researchers led by Sophia (Bérénice Bejo) swim into the wrong side of a mako feeding frenzy.
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