By Alyssa Winn

Challengers is an exploration of eroticism in the broadest sense: the eroticism of competition, the sensuality of sport, and the messiness of human relationships.

Challengers, directed by Luca Guadagnino. At movie houses throughout New England.

From left: Mike Faist, Zendaya, and Josh O’Connor in Challengers. Photo: MGM /Courtesy Everett Collection

In Luca Guadagnino’s earlier films, we often feel like trespassers. This is a director who has become a master of curating private moments, positioning the viewer as a privileged, if somewhat clandestine, observer.

In Challengers, the intimacy remains, but the exclusivity does not. We are invited.

Tashi Duncan (Zendaya), a once prodigal tennis player whose career was ended by an injury, has reinvented herself as a coach. She stands at the apex of a fraught love triangle. There’s her husband, Art (Mike Faist), a disciplined but burnt-out champion, while on the other side of the net stands Art’s childhood best friend, Patrick (Josh O’Connor), a once superior competitor who is scrambling in the shadows of his former glory.

Tashi sees Art’s frustration, and how it is contributing to his dwindling confidence, after a series of lost matches. To revitalize his tennis career, she signs him up for a Challenger — the lower stakes tournament tier in the world of men’s tennis. A space where the obstacles are high but not insurmountable, a proving ground for bruised champions needing to taste victory again. When the couple finds out Patrick is Art’s opponent, the match becomes a battle, a clash steeped in layers of personal history that Guadagnino deftly unfolds through the film’s nonlinear narrative. As the story darts back and forth in time, we’re given glimpses of past confrontations and collaborations, each adding emotional resonance to what might otherwise, on the surface, be just another tournament match.

Guadagnino’s earlier “invisible” filmmaking style has been swapped for a framework that feels more regimented and experimental. A major part of this shift is served by the muscular visuals of the exquisite Thai cinematographer Sayombhu Mukdeeprom. In this welcome reunion with Guadagnino (after their lauded collaboration on Call Me By Your Name), he plants his shots with the graceful finesse of a finely tuned athlete. The camera is often kinetic and placed at peculiar angles — high, low, and at one point, inside the tennis ball during a match.

The emphasis in Challengers on action and physicality extends from the camera and into the performances.

The film doesn’t just suggest intimacy; it revels in the physicality of its characters, magnified by slow-motion close-ups of dripping sweat and toned muscles into an erotic spectacle and appreciation of athleticism. The physicality between the characters is not subtle (it’s not meant to be): Patrick’s encroachment on Art’s space, his consumption of phallic-resembling snacks, and even the precisely suggestive way the two embrace after winning a match. As a film that’s being helmed as an erotic thriller, there isn’t even any sex. Tashi puts it best: “Tennis is a relationship.” That’s where the passion is at its peak.

The film’s treatment of the characters’ sexuality is refreshingly understated; it neither confines the characters within rigid labels nor sensationalizes their relationship dynamics. The pressure cooker of their relationship takes center stage.

One of the biggest mysteries surrounding this film is what truly drives each character’s actions. Art’s admonition to Patrick, “You think you’ve won before the match is over,” epitomizes what I believe to be the film’s ethos: the real game is enduring. Tashi, the sun in which this threesome orbits, is hard to pinpoint, and figuring her out seems to hold the key to this film. But the one irrefutable truth about Tashi is as simple as it is complex: she is driven by a relentless pursuit of excellence, a pursuit that both defines and consumes her.

This pursuit of being the best propels the trio’s intense confusion. Does it all come down to winning and losing? Through years of lovemaking, backstabbing, high highs and low lows, tennis appears to have become the only language they know how to speak to one another.

Zendaya, in her portrayal of Tashi, injects a seductive coolness so potent it ices out the room — a powerful contrast to Patrick’s peacocking and Art’s nervousness. This might just be the role to hand Zendaya her Oscar; for the first time, her talents blossom because she has been given a chance to handle nuances, an opportunity she hasn’t had in her previous roles. Josh O’Connor is a scene-stealer. Just one flash of his smile — both daring and encouraging — keeps Tashi and Art balancing on their tightrope. Meanwhile, Mike Faist’s performance underlines his character’s earnestness. His heavy posture and furrowed brow convey the very traits that resonate with Art’s strengths, his diligence and loyalty — virtues that simultaneously attract and repel Tashi.

This film cannot be talked about without discussing the electrifying soundtrack crafted by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. It’s pivotal to the fabric of Challengers, an electronic house music beat that doesn’t just intensify the film’s atmosphere but practically transforms it, marrying the kinetic chaos of a rave with the excitement and adrenaline of desire. As the narrative skips and jumps, so does the soundtrack — a pulsating, psychedelic force that thrusts us into the heightened emotional states of the characters.

Challengers is an exploration of eroticism in the broadest sense: it is about the eroticism of competition, the sensuality of sport, and the messiness of human relationships — all culminating in a plot that teases and taunts both the characters and the viewers. The film does not shy away from spooling out unaddressed threads. But this is what turns it into an interactive viewing experience. No distractions — just us and them. The film becomes a psychological puzzle where the pieces need to be assembled by the audience.

Confessional Note: I was an extra in one of the most talked-about scenes in Challengers — Art & Patrick sharing a churro. Thanks, CP Casting! Most of the time background actors are not likely to get close to any of the action. But, in an extraordinary stroke of luck, I found myself just a few feet away from the camera, so I had a front-row seat to the actors working with Guadanigno for a couple of hours. If you want an autograph, I’m now taking requests.

Alyssa Winn is a recent graduate of Boston University, where she earned her degree in Film & Television. Her passion for film extends to her roles as a director and producer, where she has brought to life a collection of award-winning short films, commercials, and music videos. Her Maslow’s hierarchy of needs includes talking about movies, jazz clubs, exuberant dinner parties, and a commitment to not taking things too seriously.