★★★★
Sweaty, muscular and desperately horny, that of Luca Guadagnino Challengers lusts in the manner of an old courtly novel. The focus is on the court – it’s a tennis movie – but the romance is as pervasive as it is dripping with the erotic energy of an unfulfilled climax. Every game is sexual intercourse. As befits Chaucerian tradition, there are knights, jousts, and a fair maiden worth fighting for. More modern is the youthful dynamism of the piece. Guadagnino’s casting is electric, but it’s his own reinvention of point-of-view cinema that brings out the avant-garde vigor.
Tennis is a relationship. Well done, it’s the ultimate message of love of sport. Such is Challengers» the central idea and the starting, intermediate and final point from which his story arose. Mike Faist (West Side Story) and Josh O’Connor (God’s own country) play boarding school brothers Art Donaldson and Patrick Zweig. This is a successful varsity doubles duo, but quite mundane in itself – at least at first. Zendaya’s Tashi Duncan is a far superior player, a promising newbie, poised for both tournament and market success. Tashi triangulates the bond that unites the boys, but also serves as a conduit for the denied desire that separates them.
Capped by the drama that unfolds during a 2019 Challenger competition, the film’s core is fractured over thirteen years of back-and-forth storytelling. Only by being exposed to the past can the intensity of current tensions truly be understood. Where the three-way vanity is quite simple, the power games are less so. There is a dynamic of desire, true, but a bitter undercurrent of class friction. While Art and Patrick owe their careers to a purchased education, Tashi’s prowess is entirely meritocratic. It was also cruelly stolen from him during a grimacing injury in the middle of the match. Later, she will think to Art that there is no child or old lady she would not have killed for a second chance. Later still, she will become annoyed by the disposable arrogance with which Patrick plays with the opportunities offered to him: “You have a better shot with a gun in your mouth.”
It’s through the simplicity of the story – in which Art and Patrick struggle over their feelings for Tashi – that the filmmakers are able to let a creative opportunity slip away. For his part, Guadagnino handles his camera like a director possessed. Its movement is dizzying, with vantage points above, below and, in one remarkable case, into the beating heart of the game. Fun sequences capture the side-by-side momentum of spectators’ heads, while others lose any sense of control, thanks to Marco Costa’s frenetic editing, to thrilling but nauseating effect. There aren’t many tennis films in the history of cinema, but none before has better captured the power, speed and danger of the moving ball.
In perfect synchronicity, a score rich in synths of The social networkTrent Reznor and Atticus Ross pick up the pace with well-chosen electric notes and thunderous rhythms. The choral interludes can soften at times, but the overall rhythm is relentless and bombastic in tone. Although such intensification most often occurs at the height of gameplay, Challengers“Significant moments off the field are also under wraps. These include a stormy tryst, swirling into a pathetic mistake, and a hotel engagement that deviates wildly from expectations.
With barely a supporting player among them, Challengers is quite the promised trio. Faist does well to elicit a desperate need for sympathy as Art, while O’Connor embodies the infuriating boyish charm of the role of Patrick. It was the latter who taught the former to masturbate, thus recounting their relationship. Ultimately, of course, the film is Zendaya’s. So often the movie teenager, Zendaya is both star and producer here, wearing Challengers with the gravity of a talent entering the age of maturity as an actress. As the film reaches its climax, Tashi can only watch from the sidelines. Imperturbable, Zendaya offers the sequence a truly extraordinary richness of expression and nuances.
T.S.