Guadagnino’s ‘Challengers,’ a tale of tennis courtship, is if nothing else a smash hit
How many times in your life have you been compelled to play less than your best? Probably a lot more than you would’ve thought.
For hardly anyone is money the reason. It’s generally age — fathers playing with sons, older brothers competing with younger brothers, high schoolers having to entertain grade schoolers. Often, big kids don’t mind squashing little kids. But sometimes, they do.
On the elite level, if it does happen, perhaps it’s just professional courtesy. A quarterback might give up kind of easily on a potentially record-breaking sack. A pitcher may groove one to the legendary hitter trying to break a home-run record.
The idea of maybe throwing a game, and why someone may do so, is the best drama in Luca Guadagnino’s curious “Challengers,” a tedious love-triangle film that disdains love. There are two scenes, both late in this 131-minute film, in which one character will sense that another is not giving their best effort. The movie implies that such an instance is a Catch-22 — the recipient of this largesse is more likely to be offended than pleased, even if, without this gesture, the outcome may well be worse.
“Challengers” faults on its shooting locations — it’s a movie that takes us from one hotel/motel room to another to deliver one speech after another, as if the models (male and female) in those Calvin Klein underwear ads were suddenly springing a backstory on us. Its timeline flashbacks are for a while comfortable, then annoying, but perhaps better than having everything explained by the characters. It does make sense that Guadagnino, whose best-known work is likely “Call Me by Your Name,” would be interested in tennis. It’s a glamour sport with attractive, physical elites, and whenever the story needs a jolt of action, it can turn to sports photography.
But tennis visuals aren’t as strong as with other sports because the players are so far apart. And on the courts, Guadagnino is most excited about smashing racquets and cursing. There is a curious interest in smoking cigarettes too. When the characters aren’t giving speeches in hotel rooms or destroying their equipment, they are pounding tennis balls back and forth. Critics seem to praise the thumping musical vibe, but the tennis volleys and the sounds of the shots are occasionally dizzying. Exactly what do the shots sound like? Something in between cannon fire and balloons popping. Guadagnino’s version of tennis is pure power, not accuracy. The actors do look like elite players, though Zendaya revealed to Jimmy Kimmel a CGI element that makes sure the shots land where they are supposed to.
Some movie titles are obvious. This one is not. “Challengers” is part of tennis vernacular, and some movies use nomenclature titles to educate and pique curiosity, but “Challengers” is flat and doesn’t seem to reveal anything about the characters after the credits roll.
Zendaya’s greatest impact here is as lingerie model, which happens early, and sometimes afterwards. The camera loves closing in on her. But the longer the movie goes, her presence frustrates. She started off with the fun guy, then switched allegiances based on career potential. She’s really not machiavellian; she’s a cheerleader. She is a perfect motif for a tennis film; she’s the prize that elites play for, without even really knowing why they are playing for her. She is much like the Darien character in “Wall Street,” whose attainment is necessary to cement a male in the big leagues, except that Darien unlike Tashi is a mere bystander. If you’re going to collect your Stanford degree and move on to a regular job, you’ll end up with a coed and working for a Megacap Tech giant. Only if you’re intending to win a Slam can you get the Tashis.
It seems there must be something really important about Tashi’s hair. The ponytail, apparently, is something of a statement in tennis. Former tennis great Andrea Petkovic indicates as much in an essay about the movie for The Guardian. For reasons that perhaps many won’t grasp, this bit of production was probably considered the most important of the movie. The credited personal hair stylist for Zendaya is Kimberly Kimble.
There are billions of people in this world; our lives are centered around just a select few. That is a necessity for movies, which generally have only a couple of hours and can’t overwhelm us with fringe characters. Sometimes, in movies such as “Challengers” and, say, “The Godfather” or “The Way We Were,” it borders on the ridiculous — drama is built around unlikely couples, not because of some powerful chemistry but because there’s simply nobody else in the movie to date. (Certainly, neither of the players in “Challengers” is going to hook up with any of Tashi’s opponents.) There aren’t even any dubious exes or greedy agents interrupting the proceedings.
There is no Meet Cute in “Challengers,” and that is actually a major flaw. According to the timeline, one of the male characters announces to the other that Tashi is, essentially, Helen of Troy. The other male character is skeptical, but after a night out that feels more like a job interview pronounces himself hooked in agreement. “Challengers,” which requires endless speeches because it fails to really show us anything about these characters, is too lazy to try to sell the viewer — we’ll just have to take the guys’ word for it.
The script tells us — but, despite voluminous tennis footage, really doesn’t show — that the two male players are equal. One took the very practical approach in life and found himself a winner of Slam events. The other does not have his act together for some reason (which makes his attendance at Stanford curious) and has somehow squandered impressive talent, though he’s the more exciting performer, kind of like Mike and the Worm in “Rounders.” And like “Rounders,” and despite the constant locale of hotel rooms, “Challengers” is very much a New York film. We’re eventually told that Art and Patrick could play an even match, but apparently only because Art has been slumping and may be running on empty.
For all three of the “Challengers” characters, life is only about tennis. That’s far more of a Movies Thing than an actual Everday Life Thing, and it’s not a rare movie concept. Tim Robbins wonders at lunch in “The Player” if everyone could just go a moment without actually talking about Hollywood. John Milner in “American Graffiti” is only as good as his car. “Challengers” might well be telling us that our jobs are perhaps the key source of our self-worth. It is not telling us what to do about that notion, if true.
There is lots to be cynical about in “Challengers” that brings to mind ’70s and ’80s movies’ commentary on American culture, perhaps the Me Decade and Greed Decade, etc. We get more than two hours of people who are rich and famous because of their athleticism and looks, not because they have any interest whatsoever in delivering great benefits to society. No one in this film (other than the workers at the tennis match) has to pay their dues. Even a catastrophic injury is barely just a speed bump, although, we have to wonder if the males would be in just as much demand had they blown out a knee. The slacker can be, of his volition, the poorest Stanford graduate in the world, but we’re told he’s got the trust fund backup parachute waiting for him.
“Challengers” may indeed be making a point about modern economics. But the cultural point it really seems to want to make is about sexual ambiguity, that even characters in a high-testosterone, country-club environment aren’t nearly as narrow as they may seem. There are some strong parallels here to Alfonso Cuarón’s “Y tu mamá también.” “Open” may not be the perfect term for this particular environment of exploration in “Challengers,” but none of the characters seems to be hiding anything.
“Challengers” might make a lot of viewers wonder why anyone watches this sport. It pokes fun at the elevated status of athletics and celebrity. There are, at most, a couple hundred people watching this winner of Grand Slam tennis events play a championship match. The match umpire is a unique individual. Incorporating (repeatedly) a long-running tennis joke, “Challengers” shows the spectators’s faces quietly turning from left to right, right to left. The “industry” seems populated by chippy and/or quirky staffers. Only once is the star asked for an autograph, and he provides what must be a tiny scribble. “Challengers” has things to say. Is it any good? That’s a borderline call.
2 stars
(May 2024)
“Challengers” (2024)
Starring
Zendaya
as Tashi Donaldson
♦
Mike Faist
as Art Donaldson
♦
Josh O’Connor
as Patrick Zweig
♦
Darnell Appling
as Umpire (New Rochelle Final)
♦
Bryan Doo
as Art’s Physiotherapist
♦
Shane T Harris
as Art’s Security Guard
♦
Nada Despotovich
as Tashi’s Mother
♦
Joan Mcshane
as Line Judge (New Rochelle Final)
♦
Chris Fowler
as TV Sports Commentator (Atlanta 2019)
♦
Mary Joe Fernandez
as TV Sports Commentator (Atlanta 2019)
♦
A.J. Lister
as Lily
♦
Connor Aulson
as Leo Du Marier
♦
Doria Bramante
as Woman With Headset (Atlanta 2019)
♦
Christine Dye
as Motel Front Desk Clerk
♦
James Sylva
as Motel Husband
♦
Kenneth A. Osherow
as Motel Husband
♦
Kevin Collins
as New Rochelle Parking Lot Guard
♦
Burgess Byrd
as USTA Official / Line Judge US Open Jr.
♦
Jason Tong
as Line Judge (New Rochelle Final)
♦
Hudson Rivera
as Y. Kucera (US Open Jr. Player)
♦
Noah Eisenberg
as T. Svoboda (US Open Jr. Player)
♦
Emma Davis
as A. Mueller (US Open Jr. Player)
♦
Naheem Garcia
as Tashi’s Father
♦
Alex Bancila
as Grosu
♦
Jake Jensen
as Finn Larsen
♦
Konrad Ryba
as Player (New Rochelle Locker Room)
♦
Hailey Gates
as Helen (Patrick’s Date)
♦
Andrew Rogers
as Art’s Teammate (Stanford)
♦
Beverly Kristenson Helton
as Umpire (Stanford Match)
♦
Brad Gilbert
as Art’s Trainer (Ohio 2011)
♦
Sam Xu
as Art’s Fan
♦
Caleb Schneider
as Puppeteer
Directed by: Luca Guadagnino
Written by: Justin Kuritzkes
Producer: Luca Guadagnino
Producer: Zendaya
Producer: Rachel O’Connor
Producer: Amy Pascal
Co-producer: Kim H. Winther
Associate producer: Darnell Appling
Associate producer: Daniela Venturelli
Executive producer: Bernard Bellew
Executive producer: Lorenzo Mieli
Executive producer: Kevin Ulrich
Music: Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross
Cinematography: Sayombhu Mukdeeprom
Editing: Marco Costa
Casting: Francine Maisler
Production design: Merissa Lombardo
Art direction: Paul Alix, Jasmine Cho
Supervising art director: Matthew Gatlin
Set decoration: Jess Royal
Costume design: Jonathan Anderson
Makeup and hair: Amber Voner, Kimberly Kimble, Kellie Robinson, Fernanda Perez, Massimo Gattabrusi, Mary Chipman, Sarah McGray, Krystal Poulin, Sherryn Smith, Cheryl Vernae Williams, Danarose Lobue, Ashley Lorrington, Megan Charles, Rob Greene, Rebecca Serra, Craig Lindberg, Mike Rotella
Stunts: John Vincent Mason
