PREMISE
A former tennis prodigy turned coach, turned her husband into a champion. But to overcome a losing streak, he needs to face his ex-best friend AND her ex-boyfriend.
THE GOOD STUFF
THE BIG 3- This is a 2-hour and 10-minute movie that is largely a movie between three characters. Zendaya, MIke FaIst, and Josh O’Connor carry the film easily, they are given a lot to do and these characters are very well-written. Their performances are all extraordinary. I went into this kind of thinking that it was going to be a movie that was made to showcase Zendaya specifically by design… but it’s not quite that way. Faist and O’Connor are really doing a lot of flashy scene chewing things even when she’s not on screen.
THE TENNIS STUFF- There’s been some complaining about the gobs of slow motion in this movie. People who probably don’t watch tennis keep complaining about that, and I got to say it’s a necessary thing to do. I can only imagine filming a tennis match is a lot like filming a boxing match. Everything moves so fast and so furiously, that catching little nuances is practically impossible.
On top of that, Luca Guadagnino has chosen creative ways to shoot the sport by showing the first-person perspective of both the tennis competitors and even the ball as it’s getting hit. I’ve never seen this before in a movie. I don’t know if it’s done well, because nobody’s done it quite like this before, but it was coherent and that’s all you can really ask.
THE TRIANGLE- Gotta say, This is the most engrossing love triangle put to the screen since like Vicky Cristina Barcelona back in 2008. Since then there have been plenty of romantic comedies, and there have especially been plenty of young adult novel adaptations for the screen that don’t even come close to being this in-depth with the complexity of a love triangle.
THE BAD STUFF
TASHI DUNCAN- It is completely fine to acknowledge that Zendaya has an amazing performance in this movie…and that her character is terribly executed. One of the major critical flaws of this movie is that we do not see why her character Tashi Duncan is worth all the trouble other than the fact that she’s very attractive. There are many many instances where Faist and O’Connor’s characters comment on her beauty and feverishly thirst for her. Understandable. However, Duncan is not kind, nor is she a good partner to either of these characters.
THE SOUNDTRACK- So you’re going along in this movie right? And there are these amazing moments of tension. Multiple moments. Emotionally resonant confessions of love, acts of betrayal, and the like. And yet, I found it nearly impossible to be engrossed in these things because instead of just playing a nice underlying instrumental score, we get music like this playing throughout every dialogue-heavy scene in the movie. And I’m torn. Because the songs aren’t necessarily bad, but they’re very loud. The soundtrack to this movie essentially is club music done by Nine Inch Nails. Good songs, but these ain’t gentle tunes.
(TIP: You should probably NOT see this film in a “Premium” auditorium. (IMAX, DOLBY, ICE, etc) The score of the film MIGHT drown out the dialogue in some instances)
THE NONLINEAR NARRATIVE- This is a movie that has multiple flashbacks and multiple flash-forwards. On one hand, it is admirable that this happens so much, and still manages to be completely coherent storywise. The big problem with this though is that it takes away these small moments of these characters doing anything but messing with one another. Any other facets of their lives other than this love triangle are absolutely not shown so it kinda zaps the small moments of humanity that could be shown away.
THE UGLY STUFF
THESE F****** DUDES- There are a lot of things that I want to discuss in terms of the relationship between the Faist and O’Connor characters that are super spoilery so I can’t go into that here. But i will say this… There is no hand-to-hand combat in this movie between these two characters. None. And I’m going to tell you as a grown-ass man that there are multiple violations of the bro code in this movie that are so severe that it is absolutely f****** unrealistic for a fist fight to not occur on sight after ANY of these violations occur.
I don’t care what culture you’re from, or what age you are, there are at least three instances in this movie where the only realistic response to these kinds of disrespectful activities is an actual physical fight and you’d have to be on a Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi, or high as hell Bob Marley level of inner peace to not go that route.
THE ENDING- This ending does not make sense. Given what the buildup is to the climax of this movie, this ending Does. Not. Make. Any. Since. I defy someone to even try to symbolically tell me what this ending is trying to tell the audience when it comes to this story. Seriously. I dare you.
The buildup to this climactic scene is masterfully done. The final scene itself up until the last five or so minutes of the actual movie is done in an incredible way, and the performances are so on f****** point. But then the last 5 minutes happened and it flushes all of it down the toilet.
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When it comes to a movie like this at the end of the day, you do just kind of have to consider the ratio of good to bad things that happen when suggesting it to someone else. CHALLENGERS is a movie that barely has more good things than bad things. The performances alone make this worth the watch…there’s just so much other stuff that doesn’t need to be there or is done in an obnoxious way.
CHALLENGERS is in theaters now
