Zendaya's new filmChallengers has served up an ace with movie critics.
The movie currently holds a 91% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes and was praised for being a 'slick, sexy, hugely entertaining tennis romantic triangle' byTy Burr fromThe Washington Post.
Meanwhile the Hollywood Reporter's David Rooney summarized the film as 'Smart, seductive and bristling with sexual tension' adding that 'Challengers is arguably Luca Guadagnino's most purely pleasurable film to date; it’s certainly his lightest and most playful.'
In Challengers, which is set for release on April 26, Zendaya's, 27, character - an aspiring tennis star Tashi Duncan - gives up her career after suffering a major injury.
Instead, she focuses on coaching her colleague Art, played by Mike Faist, whom she falls in love with and marries.
Zendaya's new film Challengers has served up an ace with movie critics who praised it for its 'sexy romantic triangle'; Zendaya pictured with co-starsMike Faist andJosh O'Connor
But Tashi finds her feelings dangerously divided after Art is enrolled on the Challenger Tour, where he faces off against Tashi's ex-boyfriend Patrick, played by Josh O'Connor.
'The movie's a paean to hard work and hedonism, and if its pleasures are mostly surface — grass, clay, emotional — it's still been too long since we've had an intelligent frolic like this,' Burr added in his review.
Amy Nicholson from The Los Angeles Times calls it 'a trim, naughty, ferociously well-acted trifle about characters more likely to scrawl something foul on a bathroom stall than quote Heracl*tus.'
She adds, 'Zendaya's performance slices through the noise... She gets the funniest, meanest comebacks and holds the screen like a woman in command, even when she allows the film to leer.'
'It wants to engage and entertain you, and it does that very nicely,' Manohla Dargis of the New York Timeswrote about the film.
Brian Truitt from USA Todaysuggested that the movie, 'Falls nebulously somewhere between a coming-of-age flick, dysfunctional relationship drama and snazzy sports extravaganza, Guadagnino nevertheless holds serve with yet another engaging, hot-blooded tale of flawed humans figuring out their feelings.'
'A funny, tempestuous, and exuberantly lusty story about how three athletic demigods see their destinies upended. And Guadagnino tells it the way he knows best, with a sometimes exasperating but ultimately irresistible surfeit of style,' Justin Chang of the New Yorker wrote.
David Sims from The Atlantic praised the film for being 'far more thrilling, and triumphant, than a simple tale of someone lifting a trophy, or love conquering all.'
The movie currently holds a 91% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes and was praised for being a 'slick, sexy, hugely entertaining tennis romantic triangle' by Ty Burr for The Washington Post
'Smart, seductive and bristling with sexual tension' wrote Hollywood Reporter's David Rooney, adding that 'Challengers is arguably Luca Guadagnino's most purely pleasurable film to date'
Amy Nicholson from The Los Angeles Times calls it 'a trim, naughty, ferociously well-acted trifle'
In Challengers Zendaya's character - an aspiring tennis star Tashi Duncan - gives up her career after suffering a major injury. Instead, she focuses on coaching her colleague Art, played by Mike Faist, whom she falls in love with and marries
But Tashi finds her feelings dangerously divided after Art is enrolled on the Challenger Tour, where he faces off against Tashi's ex-boyfriend Patrick
The New York Post called Challengers this year’s 'Saltburn' - a nod to Emerald Fennell's 2023 film famous for its shocking explicit scenes.
'Challengers may not be this director’s most psychologically insightful movie—the characters can at times feel like chess-piece contrivances rather than fully rounded individuals—but it’s almost certainly his most entertaining and fastest-paced,'Slate'sDana Stevens wrote.
'The plot of Challengers might sound stale, and yet, there’s an electric spark to Guadagnino’s approach that elevates the material, rendering it fresh,' Peter Debruge from Varietyquipped.
However, not all wrestlers impressed. Kyle Smith from the Wall Street Journalpenned, '[Luca Guadagnino] does his best to give substance to a thin, soapy story, but he relies so heavily on gimmicks (several montages feature electronic dance music) that he starts to seem desperate.'
Meanwhile Vulture's Angelica Jade Bastién wrote, 'The details of these people’s lives and their interiorities are so thinly drawn they feel more like beautiful ideas crashing into one another and leaving little messes that are too easy to clean up.'
Meanwhile Guadagnino previously praised Zendaya's talents, explaining she worked with tennis pro and former player Brad Gilbert to prepare for the part.
Luca gushed to Variety last October: 'She's wonderful. I mean, wow. We edited the movie and we almost actually don't use any of her double. She's so good.
He added that 'all three leads spent like three months working very hard—technically, athletically.'
Zendaya was praised her for her chemistry with her co-stars; seen with Josh and Mike on Wednesday in New York
Challengers is set for release on April 26
In a recent interview, Zendaya admitted that having an intimacy coordinator on set was 'very helpful,' and praised them for keeping a 'safe' environment on set.
'We had an intimacy coordinator which was fantastic and very helpful, because it was important that we felt safe,' she told The Hollywood Reporter.
The film is suffused with 'intense' erotic scenes between Zendaya and her leading men, so the trio needed to find ways to decompress when they were on camera.
'I spoke with my colleagues so that we could find a way to feel at ease. We played tennis together, we went out together, we rehearsed together,' she shared. 'We got to bond and feel good with each other.'
