Under Paris delivers my second favourite shark movie of all time. The first is Jaws, of course. That whole slew of Sharknado films couldn’t do a damned thing for me. They are so far beyond cheesy that they become an embarrassment.

You have to be able to walk a line with shark movies, to balance the scares against the narrative and find a happy medium without sacrificing everything to a visual effects budget. Under Paris does a great job of this. Sure there are several shots in the climax of the film where the VFX are horrible, but by that time you’re so invested in the fun of the story that you’re willing to give it a pass.

There are a lot of nods to Jaws (the triathlon sequence at the end has a number of them, a couple to Deep Blue Sea, and some fantastic underwater sequences and location work that make Paris look absolutely amazing, even in the middle of a bloodbath.

Stealing a page from Jaws The Revenge a shark seems to follow a researcher, Sophia (Berenice Bejo) back to Paris and seems to have adapted to the fresh water of the Seine. And that’s just the beginning of the horrible things that are going to happen Under Paris.

Sophia is approached by Mika (Lea Leviant) about helping the shark, which Sophia refers to as Lilith (which hints at who this shark is if you know Christian mythology), return to the ocean. But her humanitarian efforts don’t take a number of things into account and leads to an absolutely horrifying sequence.

Sophia goes to the river police for help, and with one of the cops at her side, Adil (Nassim Lyes), she hopes to stop Lilith by either getting her back in the wild or by killing her. Whatever ends up being safer for Pairs.

There are some truly horrifying sequences, the catacombs sequence when a flare makes a stunning revelation is nothing short of jaw-dropping and is one of many WTF moments that showed how much I got caught up in the film.

Some of the VFX are great, the location work is wonderful, the underwater camerawork is fantastic, the characters aren’t just tropes they have some layers, or as much as they can in a genre film that gets to the chomping pretty quick.

There are the authority figures who want the beaches open, sorry, the Seine open for the triathlon, the expert, the surprises and lots of glimpses of a fin cutting through the waves.

It looks great and honestly, it’s just a fun ride. This is one I want to introduce people to, share with them, and just enjoy over and over again. There’s some really wonderful things going on here, and for the first time in a long time, we have a shark movie that isn’t too camp, isn’t too over-the-top, but is just loud, bloody and a good romp.

Damn I liked this one. And that ending!