Horror Movie Review: Under Paris (2024)

Under Paris is a French action-horror film directed by Xavier Gens, releasing in 2024 via Netflix.

Sophia Assalas is an oceanographer who specializes in marine ecosystems. She and her team have been studying the rapid growth of a female shark they’ve named Lilith near a huge garbage patch in the Pacific Ocean. But their research expedition takes a tragic turn when Lilith attacks. Sophia ends up losing her entire crew including her husband Chris.

Three years pass and a still grieving Sophia is now giving tours at a Paris aquarium. On her way home she’s approached by 20-year-old Mika, the idealistic leader of the Save Our Seas Collective, an underground organization of young environmentalists inspired by Sophia’s work. Mika informs Sophia that her group has been monitoring Lilith via an old tracking beacon once used by Sophia and her team.

It turns out Mika and company claim to have spotted the now enormous Lilith in the Seine River. Sophia doesn’t believe it at first. But after she dusts off her old tracking equipment and sees it for herself, she realizes Mika is right.

After a man is found dead with wounds from shark bites, police diver Adil recruits Sophia to help find and kill the shark, but Mika and Ben turn off the beacon before they can do so in the hope that they can rescue her later.

Sophia and Adil petition the Mayor of Paris to postpone the upcoming triathlon. The mayor refuses, emphasizing the event’s importance for focusing global attention on Paris during the run-up to the Olympic Games which billions of euros have already been spent on.

You can see where this is going right? Check out Under Paris to witness the shark filled carnage unfold.

Under Paris is good…..When it finally gets going anyway. Let’s be real, we’re in this for the shark attacks right? This is a shark attack movie after all. Annoyingly, Under Paris takes a bit of a long road approach to get to what you want. Sure, we get the opening scene but after that there’s just a whole load of driving around on boats, talking and theorizing between characters. These characters are all quite bland which doesn’t help matters much.

You must sit through the investigatory stuff and commentary about the environment and nature getting its own back on the meddling humans. None of this is executed poorly at all so at least there’s that. The film in general is shot nicely and the acting is really quite good so no real complaints. Additionally, there are a few memorable highlights. One of them involves a tense scene inside a catacomb that ends with some gnarly looking gore.

The final 15 minutes of carnage does make the wait feel worthwhile in the end I suppose. It’s quite a spectacular finale akin to something you’d expect to see in a Roland Emmerich film. In a lot of ways, it got me excited for some kind of sequel to see what happens next which is no bad thing.

Overall, Under Paris is worth watching. The shark attack moments are satisfying with some great looking gore effects. There’s some dodgy moments of course but it’s functional all the same. I watched this dubbed and it was practically seamless, great job Netflix.