Netflix Apex: Where It Was Filmed, Is Wandarra National Park Real, and What Critics Are Saying

Apex was filmed primarily in New South Wales, Australia, with the Blue Mountains — located approximately 80 kilometres west of Sydney — serving as the main shooting location. A small number of scenes were also filmed in Møre og Romsdal county in Norway, including the opening prologue set on the Troll Wall. Principal photography began in the first week of February 2025 and wrapped in April 2025, with reshoots taking place in July 2025. The filming locations are confirmed by IMDb and Ausfilm International.

No. Wandarra National Park is a fictional location created for the film. It does not exist as a listed or designated national park in Australia. The real-world filming location used to represent Wandarra National Park is the Blue Mountains in New South Wales — a UNESCO World Heritage-listed region covering more than one million hectares, known for its eucalyptus forests, dramatic sandstone cliffs, river gorges, and rapid-filled waterways. The Sydney Morning Herald confirmed that Australians will recognise the Blue Mountains as the fictional Wandarra National Park.

Apex is a 2026 survival thriller directed by Baltasar Kormákur and written by Jeremy Robbins. Charlize Theron plays Sasha, a grieving adrenaline junkie who travels to the remote Australian wilderness to seek solace following the death of her partner. She soon finds herself hunted by Ben — played by Taron Egerton — a ruthless serial killer and skilled outdoorsman who has been stealing her gear and waiting for her arrival. What follows is a deadly cat-and-mouse chase through forests, caves, rapids, and cliff faces. Eric Bana also stars. The film runs 96 minutes and is rated R.

Apex holds a Metacritic score of 59 out of 100, based on 15 critic reviews, as of its release date of 24 April 2026. IMDb lists the film under its official title Apex (2026) with a production listing confirming the Blue Mountains, New South Wales as its primary filming location. Rotten Tomatoes scores had not been officially published at the time of this article's writing. Individual critic reactions ranged from two stars from The Guardian to a broadly positive assessment from The Hollywood Reporter.

Critical reception has been mixed. Variety called it "a proudly pleasurable B-movie lavished with the benefits of A-movie craftsmanship." The Hollywood Reporter praised it as "a taut nail-biter that is well-acted, crafted with skill and briskly paced," while also commending the cinematography and score. The Sydney Morning Herald awarded three stars but noted "too many clichés and too few surprises." The Guardian gave it two stars, calling it "slick but soulless." Metacritic's consensus suggested the film prioritises spectacle over cleverness, with the survival genre's expected catharsis landing anticlimactically.

Charlize Theron performed a significant number of her own physical sequences in Apex. She told interviewers that she had never climbed before arriving in Australia and trained by kayaking frequently as a workout while building strength for the mountain climbing scenes. She confirmed she climbs actual mountains in the film and does so barefoot in some sequences. Theron completed filming despite sustaining a fractured toe during production, and joked at the film's wrap party: "It's actually a miracle that I'm here today."

Yes. Taron Egerton revealed in an interview with Outside magazine that he did not realise he had a fear of heights until filming began on Apex. He described one scene in particular — in which he was dropped 30 metres from a cliff while suspended by a wire — as especially challenging given this discovery. Despite this, Egerton praised the Australian crew in the highest terms, saying: "The crew was the most incredible crew I've ever worked with. Aussies are made of something different."

According to reports published during the production period, filming Apex in New South Wales contributed approximately $56 million in expenditure to the local economy and created over 460 local jobs. Ausfilm International, which confirmed the production news in February 2025, acknowledged the film for highlighting New South Wales's reputation as a premier location for world-class filmmaking. Director Baltasar Kormákur cited Australia's landscape, studio facilities, and local crew talent as the decisive factors in choosing the location.

Apex was directed by Baltasar Kormákur, the Icelandic filmmaker best known for directing Everest (2015) and 2 Guns (2013). The screenplay was written by Jeremy Robbins. The film was produced by Peter Chernin, Jenno Topping, David Ready, Ian Bryce, Charlize Theron, and Baltasar Kormákur for Chernin Entertainment, Ian Bryce Productions, and RVK Studios, and is distributed globally by Netflix.

Apex is available to stream exclusively on Netflix globally from Friday 24 April 2026. The film will not receive a theatrical release — it is a Netflix original and goes straight to the streaming platform. It is rated R and runs 96 minutes.