Challengers director Luca Guadagnino finally gives Zendaya the role her career has been aching for in his latest delve into erotic entanglements.
Featuring the Dune star in her first top-billed role since 2021’s Malcolm & Marie, she portrays former tennis star Tashi Duncan, who’s forced to rein in her career following a crippling knee injury.
She soon becomes the coach and husband to rising male hopeful Art Donaldson (played by Mike Faist), whose shot at the US Open is complicated by the return of his former friend and Tashi’s ex, Patrick Zweig (Josh O’Connor).
Using their head-to-head in a pivotal Challenger match in New Rochelle, New York as an enticing framing device, Challengers playfully dips in and out of the trio’s complex history of power plays and seduction.
After months of hype, driven partially by some sultry moments in the trailer implying a threesome between the three leads, the film finally arrives this weekend and is well worth the wait. Challengers is destined to become a modern classic.
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Zendaya is already dominating the best big-screen movies this year after her role opposite Timothee Chalamet in Dune finally gave her a chance to show off, and she goes several steps beyond as headstrong tennis fanatic Tashi.
She’s in complete control as her thorniest and most complicated character yet, a shrine at whose feet Art and Patrick can’t help but worship.
While her role as MJ with boyfriend Tom Holland in the Spider-Man films is charming if a little thankless, Zendaya is utterly spellbinding as Tashi, who refuses to give up after suffering one of the nastiest injuries depicted on the big screen outside of a body horror thriller.
Her facial, vocal and emotional range is displayed magnificently at every opportunity in Challengers in striking close-ups, finally showcasing her skill and generosity at navigating complex, heated scenes with other performers.
Pivotal encounters on the court or against an enigmatic storm feel Biblical and classic Hollywood in a way that is rarely depicted in the current cinematic landscape, and Zendaya is the anchor for those soon-to-be iconic moments throughout.
O’Connor and Faist are equally magnetic as the friends-turned-enemies vying for her attention, affecting a horny puppy dog demeanor that’s in turn charming and slightly sinister as tensions begin to bubble between the trio. They both kiss Zendaya as if their lives depend on it while clearly having the time of their lives with some effortless bestie banter.
Guadagnino is a master at stylistic restraint. Otherwise subdued scenes are laced with personal history and propelled by both icy and syrupy dialogue that feels heightened but never untrue. Like his previous films, some of the biggest joys come from hanging out with characters in their natural habitat before their hangups and secrets rise to the surface.
His flashiness takes a step back for most of the drama, but ramps up crucially for a final 20 minutes constructed more like an anime fight sequence than a tennis match.
The Call Me By Your Name filmmaker knows how to deliver the goods, from slow-motion sweat, kinetically ingenious POV shots and crowd-pleasing tennis tricks but, much like Tashi’s mind games, wisely makes his audience wait and beg for them.
Underneath it all, score wizards Trent Reznor and Attic Ross slice the action and drama with a pounding electronic current with the rhythm and bass of an 80s aerobics video with city slick modern flair.
Its inclusion in static conversations comes across strange at first, until it’s apparent the players’ behind-the-scenes and domestic barbs are just as charged as their head-to-heads on the court.
Languid yet riveting, sexy yet sweet, Challengers is a hot-headed masterpiece delivering a cinematic serve that might prove impossible to return.
Challengers is in cinemas today.
