Challengers
Luca Guadagnino's long-delayed tennis film is finally out, plus, some thoughts on other new releases, and David Lynch.
Happy Challengers weekend, everybody! Luca Guadagnino’s latest film, starring Zendaya, Mike Faist and Josh O’Connor is finally out, and, in a twist, I have seen it already, so I’ll be giving my thoughts on it a little bit.
I’ve also been trying to continue watching other Best Director winners where I can, although that only resulted in watching Saving Private Ryan in the past two weeks (good movie, imo), so I don’t have any significant updates on that front.
Before we talk into the titular movie of this newsletter, there are some other movies I want to bring up, starting with…
Civil War (2024, In Theaters)
Honestly, the only kind of dud that I’ve really watched in the past couple of weeks, and I think it’s largely due to, ultimately, Alex Garland not thinking much about this film beyond the concept of the film.
While on one end this is a deeply flawed movie with nothing to say beyond “wouldn’t it be fucked up if America had a fascist president that went to war on Americans and attacked them the way they attack the citizens of other countries?”, this movie does have some really strong performances from Kirsten Dunst, Stephen McKinley Henderson, and Jesse Plemons, who really do make the most of a not great script. Plemons, especially, is pretty terrifying in his one scene. The other positive I can give to this movie is that the sound design is pretty spectacular all around, which helps to build a really solid soundscape for the war that is playing out around the group of journalists we follow throughout the film.
I wish this movie was better so I could try to make a better case for it, but I feel like ever since Ex Machina, Garland has never been able to take his interesting concepts to any sort of satisfying conclusion, and I think possibly working with another director for a bit may help him refine some of his ideas better.
Abigail (2024, In Theaters)
While I’m definitely way less into Scream (2022) and Scream VI than other people are, I did like Ready Or Not (this directing pairs movie prior to their pair of Scream movies), so I figured maybe the child ballerina who also turns out to be a vampire movie that’s also kind of a heist movie would be a good time, and I was not disappointed at all. I think
This is a pretty fun movie that is really powered by a very fun cast led by Dan Stevens and Melissa Barrera that gets even better when it leans in on the humor of it all, and focuses less on the horror aspects of it. If you’re looking for something light and fun to watch, this is definitely something worth your time, just be warned that there is a comical amount of fake blood you’ll have to deal with (which, given the fact that this is a vampire movie, is not surprising at all).
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992, Criterion Channel)
We’ve now gotten to the point of the newsletter where it’s time for me to admit that instead of movies over the past few weeks, I instead watched my way through the first two seasons of Twin Peaks, all leading up to watching the prequel, Fire Walk with Me. I’d been hesitant to watch the show/most things related to David Lynch because like the fans of certain other directors (Nolan, Fincher, etc.), Lynch fans are extremely annoying to talk to, but that fandom is very justified because this show, and Lynch’s work beyond the show, is very good.
I don’t have much to say about this movie specifically, because it doesn’t mean much without any knowledge of the show, but instead, I just want to really recommend giving the show, and the prequel film a shot, because they are surprisingly accessible for as weird as a lot of Lynch’s work can feel at times. They are also really funny in surprising ways too! I haven’t been able to dive too deep into the third season (aka Twin Peaks: The Return) quite yet, but I’m extremely excited to continue watching to see where things go from here.
Challengers (2024, In Theaters)
While I was definitely already excited for this movie given Guadagnino’s most recent work (Bones and All, Suspiria), I was still surprised just how taken I was with Challengers when I saw the movie this past Monday. I think, above all else, this is an extremely well cast movie, and Zendaya, Mike Faist, and Josh O’Connor all deliver the exact kind of performances that this movie needs, and the script gives all of them juicy roles to work with.
I’ve liked performances from all three of them prior to now (Zendaya in Dune Part 2 just this year, Faist in West Side Story, and O’Connor in God’s Own Country), but this movie recognizes the strengths all of them have, and pushes all of them further than any other movie has before. I also think this is probably Luca Gudagnino’s best movie to date, and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross turn in some of their best work with a score rooted in dance music that is extremely entertaining and exactly fits the energy required by the film.
I don’t want to dig into some of the turns this movie takes, because I think this is a ride that everybody should enjoy for themselves as soon as possible, but just so I can have this on the record in case it does happen, I think there’s a fairly good chance that Zendaya could get her very first Oscar nomination for her work in this film. She’s one of the most exciting young actresses working today, and she also has Dune Part 2 this year (that she’s also great in), so I think this is all building up to a nomination to celebrate two great performances coming out within 2 months of each other.
This is my favorite movie of the year so far, the most fun I’ve had watching any movie in the past few years, and the most excited I’ve been by so many choices made in the construction of the film, so I cannot recommend this enough, so much so that I’m seeing the movie again tomorrow.
That’s all I have for this week, and I’ll be back in two weeks (on 5/10) with some more thoughts on more movies, but of course, you can find me on Letterboxd, Instagram and Twitter in the meantime as I wait desperately for my local library to get their copy of Giant back so I can finally watch it. If I’ve seen it by then, you’ll all be the first to know, since I’ll probably want to write about it.