Tennis romance that doesn’t contain much tennis: Challengers reviewed

It sounds straightforward enough: a tennis romance starring Zendaya, idol of the mid-teen demographic and last seen riding a sandworm in Dune: Part Two. She plays Tashi Duncan, a junior player tipped for greatness, who finds herself in a love triangle with two other juniors: spoilt-but-roguish Patrick (Josh O’Connor) and nice-but-needy Art (Mike Faist). You might anticipate a girl-power version of Richard Loncraine’s Wimbledon (2004), with white skirts fluttering in summer breezes, coy glances at a face in the crowd, and a dramatic climax featuring a net rally in a final-set tie-break.

But Challengers is a very different kettle of fish. At the start of the film the players’ careers seem to have already peaked: Art is rich and famous but also badly out of form and short of motivation, while Tashi, her playing days apparently over, is his wife and disgruntled coach. Patrick, meanwhile, is a washed-up journeyman, sleeping in his car at tournaments because he has no money to pay for a hotel.

We flash back to their carefree early days. Art and Patrick are best friends and doubles partners, until Tashi arrives on the scene. She susses them out at once – ‘How often does this happen? Going after the same girl?’ – and explains that her protective parents didn’t send her to a tennis academy because they were worried about boys. Clearly the parents were 100 per cent correct, since within a few moments she is – slobberingly and implausibly – simultaneously getting off with both of them and promising her number to whoever wins the next day’s singles match.

With that we plunge into a vortex of jealousy, betrayal, double-crossing, broken friendships and, since a love triangle only has so many permutations, somewhat repetitive sexual intrigue. Will she? Won’t she? Answer: Yes she will, but never for long with the same guy.