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Sicilian director Luca Guadagnino certainly is, amping up the gladiatorial aspects of the sport in his romantic melodrama, 'Challengers'.
Starring Zendaya, Josh O'Connor and Mike Faist, the film follows the ups and downs of three tennis stars and their messy love lives.
O'Connor and Faist play doubles partners and childhood tennis protege friends, Patrick Zweig and Art Donaldson who we see winning the US Open junior championship.
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Both are due to face each other in the singles final but after their doubles win, they go to the girls final where Zendaya's superstar in the making Tashi Duncan crushes her opponent, Emma Davis' Anna Mueller on the court.
Patrick is already smitten and Art is too.
So it doesn't take much effort to persuade Art to join him at a party where Tashi is celebrating her victory.
The duo awkwardly introduce themselves to Tashi at the party and flirt with her while having a smoke.
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The duo invite Tashi to join them for a beer in their hotel room but are not really confident that she'll deign to visit them.
To their surprise, she does.
Drinking Budweiser, they flirt some more.
Patrick tells an embarrassing story about Art and when they run out of beer, she beckons them onto a bed to engage in some threesome foreplay that ends up in the blokes kissing.
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Leaving them, Tashi tells them whoever wins the US Open junior single final can get her number and start dating her.
Patrick emerges victorious and they begin dating.
Pressed not long afterwards by his mate during practice if he and Tashi have had sex, Patrick playfully agrees to signal if they have by mimicking a tic Art has when he serves.
The trio wind up on the college tennis circuit at Stanford University, with Tashi and Art remaining friends.
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Tashi's relationship with Patrick, however, shows signs of strain because he just won't take his tennis seriously enough and it's not good for her brand to be dating a loser.
When Tashi suffers a career ending injury, Art is there to support her, with Patrick not immediately there to pick up the pieces.
Mourning the end of her career, she splits from Patrick and starts to invest in a relationship with Art instead.
As he becomes a men's champion in several Grand Slam events, his friendship with Patrick dissolves.
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Meanwhile Patrick's career nosedives, with him struggling to make money - at one point we see him beg for a room in a cheap motel, only to wind up sleeping in his car before a tournament.
On opposite ends of the see saw, Art and Patrick's paths cross once again when the jobbing professional ends up in the final of a challenger circuit event in New Rochelle against his old buddy who is trying to regain his confidence after an injury as he prepares for one more assault on the career Grand Slam at the US Open in Flushing Meadow.
On paper, 'Challengers' has a lot of things in its favour.
It boasts three young vibrant stars, the acclaimed director of 'A Bigger Splash' and 'Call Me By Your Name' and a script fashioned around a notoriously intense sport.
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But if you were to ask me to describe Guadagnino's film, I would say massively overrated and really tiresome.
There have been many decent movies over the years about tennis - 'Borg versus McEnroe' and 'Battle of the Sexes' spring to mind.
There has also been great films about love triangles - Michael Curtiz's 'Casablanca,' Martin Scorsese's 'The Age of Innocence' and particularly Francois Truffaut's 'Jules et Jim'.
'Challengers' doesn't even come close in either category.
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It's an irritating, souped up mess that has all the depth of a teenage group chat on WhatsApp.
It's all style and little substance.
Flashy camera angles and pounding dance music cannot disguise a flabby, self indulgent story.
The film begins decently enough with Guadagnino and his screenwriter Justin Kurtizkes framing the narrative around Art and Pat facing off against each other in the New Rochelle final and then shifting back and forth in time.
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However it quickly descends into farce, as Guadagnino tries to make up for the flaws in Kurtizkes' overblown soapy plot with some over the top visuals.
These include jerky, point of view shots from the perspective of each player during the New Rochelle final, point of view shots from the perspective of the tennis court they are playing on and a ridiculous amount of sweat, lashing off O'Connor and Faist like they've been rehearsing the title dance sequence from 'Singin' In The Rain'.
It's also hard to empathise with central characters who are as vain and self-obsessed as Art, Patrick and Tashi.
As the film churns its way towards the two hour mark, it becomes increasingly laughable like the weakest episode of 'Dynasty' and just as camp - Tashi's tryst with Patrick in a storm is a particular low point.
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Zendaya is meant to clearly be the star turn but you wouldn't think it.
She seems to spend most of her time trying to perfect that look Denzel Washington does when he's playing someone in despair.
We all know she's capable of being much better than this.
The same is true for Faist and O'Connor - the latter wasting everyone's time by smirking his way throughout the movie like he's Tom Cruise.
© Amazon MGM Studios & Warner Bros Pictures However 'Challengers' biggest crime is it's so in love with itself, it spends all of its time trying to draw the viewers' attention to how wonderful it thinks it is.
And as we all know from real life, there's nothing more boring than show offs who expect you to tell them they are geniuses.
Why waste your time on this?
New balls please...
('Challengers' was released in the UK and Ireland on April 26, 2024)
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