Set in the world of competitive tennis, filmmaker Luca Guadagnino (Call Me By Your Name, Suspiria remake) and writer Justin Kuritzkes’ Challengers is about players who are young and hungry, and not just to win. Zendaya stars as Tashi Duncan, a tennis superstar in the making who already has endorsement deals and a fashion line in the works. She’s too busy, smart, and driven to care about boys. But that doesn’t stop them from noticing her, especially two up-and-coming players, Art Donaldson (Mike Faist, West Side Story) and Patrick Zweig (Josh O’Connor, La Chimera and The Crown), who are best friends but competitors all the same, on and off the court. The are pulled toward Tashi, partly because of her looks but also because of her drive and skill. Sure, they want to kiss her, but they seem just as curious about what it’s like to operate at her level of talent and soon-to-be fame.
In all of Guadagnino’s films, he certainly examines what pulls people together, but he’s equally obsessed with what motivates and propels them toward something. Tashi makes no apologies about her game or for the fact that she does find these two fascinating as male specimens but likely not as actual love interests. Then, in a freak accident, Tashi's dreams are dashed, but her drive doesn’t die. Eventually she coaches and marries Art after dating Patrick for a time, and we’re convinced that she chose Art because he had the greatest potential to become a champion; her instincts were correct.
The framework of Challengers is a 2019 champions match between Art, who is on a losing streak, and Patrick, who has been off the scene for a while but is staging a comeback. We jump back in time to when the boys initially met Tashi 13 years earlier, but we always return to this heated battle on the court that feels like the culmination of many threads of their lives together and apart. Tensions are high, past and present collide, and every time we return to 2019, we know a bit more about what brought them here and what has been lost in the interim.
The first couple things you notice about this film aren’t story related at all. The first is that everybody is sweaty most of the time; they glisten and breathe heavily as one might after sex, and I’m guessing that's because a zesty session on the court is as good, if not better, than a roll in the sheets. The other thing we notice is the pounding, rhythmic score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, which only serves to enhance the tennis-as-sensual-exercise motif. All of this, combined with Sayombhu Mukdeeprom's sumptuous cinematography, makes Challengers one of the sexiest movies in recent memory that doesn’t lean on traditional sex scenes (which is not to say there aren’t any).
After we get to know these characters (and these are effectively the only three people in the movie, outside of the persnickety line judge of the Challengers match), we come to realize that Art is the sensitive soul, and maybe the only one of the three capable of love. But we suspect for most of the 2019 scenes (and he eventually confirms it) that he’s thinking about abandoning tennis, making him effectively useless to Tashi. As if by chance (although likely not), Patrick shows up wanting Tashi to become his coach, suspecting Art might be retiring soon. And there’s never a doubt in our minds that if this reconfiguration happens, that the marriage is done and what might have been salvageable in this friendship will never happen. The stakes of the final game are high, but the ones surrounding these relationships are epic.
There’s no real clear character we’re meant to root for in Challengers, and I suspect Guadagnino is fine with that. The interpersonal twists and turns and manipulations are often biting and burning, leaving scars that impact everything going forward. Zendaya is note perfect as a player who needs to be affiliated with greatness, and makes it clear that if her husband leaves the game on a down year, she’ll leave him. Art thinks that leaving tennis will give him more time to feel loved and supported by Tashi, and that they can raise their daughter as a real family should, but she sees everything. There is never a scene where Tashi isn’t the smartest person in the room, whether it’s fending off boyish advances or weighing the options between the two men as the film’s final showdown begins.
In terms of goals, we’re never quite sure if Patrick is plotting a comeback for the game or to win back Tashi, but to her, it’s the same thing. The film flitters between messy and emotionally volatile (but also devoid of emotions at times, making things even messier), and being a screaming act of aggression. Kindness is like the fourth most important thing in this story, and that makes it interesting and unique as a love story. You don’t have to know or care about tennis to lose yourself in this skillfully drawn tale, but if you do, you’ll notice how the screenplay structure mirrors a match, with opponents moving ahead and back, with the advantage changing hands often. In the game, “Love” means zero, and that might be the most succinct, on-the-nose metaphor the film has to offer.
There are places I could pick apart certain aspects of Challengers. I wish the film had time to explore Tashi’s career; I would love to have seen her actually coach Art and see how that element of their relationship grew; and there are gaps in the three-way friendship that I wish were more fleshed out. But in the end, I’m guessing Guadagnino left these out because they don’t matter as much. He wants us to care about where these characters end up, but doesn’t require us to care about them in the process of getting there. It’s such a gutsy way to make films, especially from a director for whom emotional journeys are a specialty. Challengers is not without heart, but it’s not the point. Some movies require tissues to wipe away the tears, but this one will make you want to take a shower after viewing—possibly a cold one.
The film is now playing in theaters.
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