Review overview Challengers: ‘Tennis film with a wink and a sense of kitsch’ | Movies & Series

“Guadagnino builds Challengers like a tennis match. He forces the viewer to look back and forth, ping-ponging between past and present. The final match proves to be a reflection of their relationship with Tashi over the years.”

“Guadagnino’s maximalist flair fits well with a film about the conjuration of recovered desire.” “By focusing on this desire, Guadagnino gets to a core of sports that most sports films seem to forget. Sure, a big part of sports is routine and training, sports drinks and massages. But without desire, tennis is nothing more than hitting a ball with a racket.”

Read the full review here

“Guadagnino presents his tennis film with a wink and a sense of kitsch. What is surprising is the pumping techno beat of Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, which can be heard with every new dramatic moment on the tennis court, but also off it, and sometimes simply wipes out dialogue. Not that, this trio doesn’t have that much interesting to say. It’s about bodies in motion, about the sweat, the looks they give each other, the control they exercise over each other.”

“But perhaps the most striking thing is that Challengers is a major coitus interruptus. Every time there’s a lovemaking scene coming up, it’s cut off. Tashi is desired by the two men. They seem to desire her, but do they really desire her? Don’t they desire the talent they see in each other? Tennis talent that is eroticized in the film, including the well-known orgasmic sounds on the tennis court.”

Read the full review here

“Italian director Luca Guadagnino says his elegant, cheerful and sexy film Challengers for him it was mainly about tennis. Service and return, razor sharp over the net, against the line: two players are needed for a long, beautiful rally. What is Borg without McEnroe, Graf without Seles, Federer without Nadal?”

“Challengers is an operatic ballet of flashback and flashforward that culminates in that one big match. Packed with sometimes almost ridiculous bravura shots: a rally from the point of view of a tennis ball, an erotic denouement in a tornado of swirling newspapers.”

Read the full review here