“Challengers” Movie Review

Released on April 26, 2024 this movie has done it. This movie has changed the tennis, cinema and relationship community.

Directed by Luca Guadagnino, this man put his entire heart and soul into these two hours and 11 minutes of drama and fun.

This movie undergoes time jumps that create a sense of mystery and forces the audience to utilize deductive reasoning. The plot isn’t handed to the audience, which makes this movie extremely entertaining.

Zendaya plays Tashi Duncan, a skilled 18-year-old tennis star who suffers a severe career-ending knee injury. In the years of her tennis career, Duncan meets Art Donaldson (played by Mike Faist) and Patrick Zweig (played by Josh O’Connor).

Faist quite possibly just became the new heartthrob of 2024, and it’s rightfully deserved. Art Donaldson can take a seat on the throne next to Peeta Mellark as the most memorable smoking hot blonde man.

This movie follows the relationship between the three young tennis champions. The trailer implied that there would be explicit scenes between the three characters.

However, the things shown in the trailer were merely all that occurred. The R-rating was given for other reasons (nudity, cursing) but not concerning the threesome.

What's so interesting about “Challengers” is that it's a piece of art crafted from thin air, as this story is not a book or a true story. By the end of the film, the audience is thankful it’s not a true story, simply because it is so insane.

The three tennis stars undergo relationship struggles with each other, all while competing on the court. There’s an air of nerves and high-stakes outcomes to every single match in this movie.

The most phenomenal film writing ever has to be the final tennis match and the way the audience perceives what’s going on. At the beginning of the match, the audience assumes what’s occurring, but by the end, the audience can deduce something completely opposite.

The soundtrack and the filming techniques make this movie stellar. For starters, the soundtrack is insane. The audience’s ears were blessed as well as their eyes.

The filming techniques deserve to belong in the museum and should win this movie an Oscar. In the last tennis match between Zweig and Donaldson, there are so many different film shots it becomes jaw-dropping. Genuinely, Guadagnino thought “POV: you’re the tennis ball” and made that dream come true.

Overall, this movie is absolutely the movie of the Summer. Tennis courts all over the world will be packed in the heat of the 2024 sun. The pickleball trend will look like nothing compared to what tennis is about to become.

Rating: 4/5

Grace Bowman is a third-year majoring in biology. To contact her, email gab5585@psu.edu.