Scream queen Kathryn Newton has booked her next scary movie and this one is a survival thriller about college friends terrorized by a bull shark.
Deadline reports that Newton will co-star with Lana Condor in Devil's Mouth, a co-production between Amazon MGM Studios and Lionsgate. While on a trip to Thailand, two friends become "trapped in an underwater cave system with a bull shark. Old tensions and power struggles resurface as they fight to survive."
Honestly, it's not the most original of storylines. It sounds very similar to 47 Meters Down: Uncaged, which followed teen girls swimming into sunken Mayan ruins and getting trapped within the underwater labyrinth of caves while surrounded by sharks. But I'm willing to give Devil's Mouth a chance, if only because Newton usually picks pretty good scripts.
This one is written by Myung Joh Wesner (High Potential) and Aja Gabel (The Staircase). Another positive for Devil's Mouth is that Deadline says it as featured on the 2019 Black List, which is a collection of the most-liked movie screenplays yet to be produced.
Here's the downside though, the movie is being directed by Jeff Wadlow who also did the script's latest revisions. Wadlow does not have a good track record with horror movies. He previously directed duds like Imaginary, Truth or Dare, and Fantasy Island, all of which received negative reviews. His Netflix film The Curse of Bridge Hollow was slightly better received but still rather forgettable. But I'll try to be optimistic about Devil's Mouth because I am a fan of Newton and Condor.
Newton is best known for her horror comedies like Lisa Frankenstein, Abigail, and Freaky. She also starred in the Marvel Cinematic Universe playing Cassie Lang in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.
Condor rose to fame with her role as Lara Jean Covey in Netflix's charming To All the Boys I've Loved Before the franchise. Next she'll appear in Coyote vs. Acme, the formerly scrapped Warner Bros. film that was recently rescued by Ketchup Entertainment and set to release in 2026. She will also star in the action thriller Ballerina Overdrive, to be distributed internationally by Amazon Prime Video.
There has been a slew of shark movies released lately. This year marks the 50th anniversary of Steven Spielberg's classic, Jaws, which still hasn't been topped. But the shark movie that has caught my interest the most is Dangerous Animals, a survival horror movie that centers on a serial killer who wants to feed his victim to sharks.