From left, Mike Faist, Zendaya and Josh O’Connor star in “Challengers,” a thriller opening April 26 in theaters.Oakland native Zendaya crushes it down the line, and from the very opening moments, in “Challengers,” Luca Guadagnino’s magnificently sexy and sweaty beyond all realistic belief “Challengers.”
Zendaya is a thunderbolt that strikes time and again in “Challengers” and she gives this passionate drama all the reverberating rumble it requires. “Challengers” fluidly jumps back and forth in time as it reveals how the past influences the present. We are shown how Tashi became a tennis sensation at an early age; at 18 she holds the world and numerous fawning guys in the palm of her hand.
Shortly thereafter, the threesome meet up at a motel — the selling point of the film’s trailer — for one hot make-out session reveals the robust, if subconscious, attraction all three have for each other. It’s a smoldering cinematic exchange and director Guadagnino — who so expertly navigated the insistent desire in “Call Me By Your Name,” with Timothee Chalamet and Armie Hammer — toys with how these two handsome straight guys are drawn to each other in ways they might not even realize.