cielrouge

[cielrouge]

prepare to be sick of me

#challengers

[cielrouge]

the way I see it, challengers is saltburn’s older, more defined, older sibling, one thing about me, I LOVE a psychosexual thriller/drama with mind-bending cinematography, scenes brimming with erotic tension, and manipulative main characters

#challengers #saltburn

[cielrouge]

The love triangle WORKS because:

Patrick has Art as soulmates do, seeing and understanding each other in a way no one else can. In silent stares and sly smirks and shared beds and a complete mastery one the other’s psyche.

Patrick loves Tashi in the way being full only comes after hunger. Oil fueling fire, burning bright before burning everything around them. Feeling love for the first time and never knowing when its too much or not enough.

Art needs Patrick in the same way you have a side of the bed you always sleep on, a brand of detergent you always buy. Stability in the unpredictable, how Patrick knows when to push and when to pull. How he has the spare key to the lock box where Art hides his desires.

Art loves Tashi like a dog needs a master. Freedom in being directed and told, the security you get from being a devoted follower to a higher being.

(And once Tashi is dragged into their orbit like a stray asteroid taken off its course)

Tashi loves Art in the same way you hate all your wasted potential. An alternative future, a time machine that could take you to where your body has not betrayed you. In him and through him she’s given every path: as a wife, a mother, a coach, a puppet master but never a player.

Tashi wants Patrick in the way smokers ignores labels on cigarette boxes. The beauty of self-destruction and passion she’s lost. Constantly chasing a high that hurts so good you’d risk everything to have it again.

Tashi hates and loves them both in equal measure. Resenting them for taking the one thing she loved away from her and forcing her to live her own dreams through two diverging paths. Loving them enough to push them back together where they belong.

And yeah, because the third in their love triangle was always tennis🙄

#challengers #challengers spoilers

[cielrouge]

I have way too many thoughts and I can’t put them into writing yet cuz I am too busy thinking about just how IN SYNC art and patrick are. The way they can predict each other so well without words. Their body language. Their energy together. I’m actually not mentally stable enough for this

#challengers

[cielrouge]

No I’m SO sorry but it’s truly so funny to me that a lot of dudes going to see challengers for the idea that they’ll see a hot naked Zendaya and what they actually get treated to is tasteful and delicate aspects of the male form from the visionary that is Luca Guadagnino (and of course very very explicitly homoerotic imagery.) And there is a healthy amount of sexualization for both forms. But the fact that there is full frontal male nudity in this movie, the only true nudity in this movie is of the male form, marketed the way it is is just so good. Like I work in a theater and the amount of dudes coming out lambasting that this movie sucks is so fucking delicious. The way straight guys have to sit and accept the queerness of this movie that it EXISTS, that it’s beautiful and tender and gentle, and intimate, but also loud, and brash, and seeped into every conceivable corner adds another 10 on top of this already 10/10 movie.

#challengers

[cielrouge]

Okay but let’s talk about Tashi and Art’s marriage.

How Art was there for her after her injury, one of the first people who rushed to help her. To help her heal, to go through arguably the worst moment of her life while holding her hand. To show her love and validation outside of the sport that was her whole life.

How Art spends the next decade of his life playing for the both of them. Pushing himself past his own limitations because this isn’t about Art, this is ahout Tashi. About her potential, about everything she could’ve been and everything he took away from her.

How the both of them know they shouldn’t have lashed out at Patrick, how it was just easier to blame him when Art knows deep down Tashi blamed him for her injury.

Love as penance, praying and hoping the next trophy would be the one that satisfies her, resentment souring the only thing that tied him to his best friend, the only thing they all shared. Laying his life on the sacrificial altar in the hopes that would earn the love and forgiveness she can’t give

#challengers #challengers spoilers

[cielrouge]

keep thinking about how tashi and patrick both love art and in their own ways want what's best for him. tashi manipulating the match so that he builds his confidence against strong players and patrick using dirty games to force art into becoming a better tennis player on his own accord. meanwhile art is aware and still lets them do anything they want to him because ultimately he feels safe being in the control of other people, specifically those two

#challengers

[cielrouge]

I can’t stop thinking about Art viewing his queerness as something to grow out of.

Why he focuses so hard on Tashi. Why he drops Patrick after college even before he’s with Tashi. Why he speaks to Patrick the way he does in the sauna.

Yeah you could argue he’s mad about the cheating in the latter and I’m sure he is. He’s once again being left out. He can’t stomach it. But he’s also so so angry at Patrick for the way he makes him feel.

He’s obsessed with Tashi. Obviously he is. But that’s the sneaky thing about bisexuality. You can focus on the real attraction you feel toward a woman and use those feelings to push out any attraction you have to men. Which… kind of… works for him. Up until Patrick returns.

#challengers #challengers spoilers

[cielrouge]

no because patrick and tashi saw each other as equals in a way they NEVER saw art. they both have wealthy family (though patrick is estranged from his) and are tennis prodigies. and most of all they are people who obfuscate and hide what they really think and want. art isn’t like them and they know it— he’s desperate and has to work hard at tennis and, though he tries sometimes to manipulate them, he is BAD at it. patrick and tashi fall apart because, fundamentally, they don’t like each other that much, even though they’re “on the level” with each other. NOT because art masterminded it. but here’s the thing: even though they both saw art as beneath them, they LIKE him better. art is the one they both want to be with. and in a way THEY are The Challengers, not patrick and art.

#challengers #challengers spoilers

[cielrouge]

Something about being forced to live through other people. Having to manipulate people like dolls because your own body can never be fixed. Watching through an outsider’s pov everyone else’s potential burn bright then fizzle out and live the cycle over and over again. Tashi Duncan they can never make me hate you babygirl

#challengers #tashi duncan

[cielrouge]

art real as hell. he said i don't wanna be left out so im gonna break up my best friends because im in love with the two of them, then im gonna get in a failmarriage with one and ignore the other and ruin everyone's lives. this won't blow up in my face down the line later at all

#challengers

[cielrouge]

My thoughts during the Churro™ scene as a professionally licensed Yapper:

SPOILERS UNDER THE CUT:

While they’re in the canteen, there’s a moment where Art looks at Patrick and you can clearly see the relief in his eyes that he has his friend there with him. (Or does he??)

I don’t think Art was lying about not keeping in touch with Patrick. In between his tennis career and his relationship, Patrick has neglected Art (which I think is because he’s so used to him being there that he just never fathomed him not being there which makes him complacent in their friendship).

But when Art realizes that once again Patrick has been taken away by just the mere image of Tashi, he’s hurt. I think in that moment Art wanted to feed that hurt, lash out and make Patrick feel the pain he feels for being left out.

Art jokes about Patrick not being there to visit him because he misses him. He misses his friend, his constant and yes, it’s in a joking manner but Patrick sees thru him (as he always does).

(The fucking head tilt took me out because it screams fond like ‘aw baby u really did miss me ure so cute when ure jealous but wont admit it’)

The entire scene (for me) turns into reassurances and doubts. Their friendship was being tested to see if it could withstand having to share their love and space with a third. Having to make concessions and space around their new desire and jealousy.

When Art tries to downplay his thoughts, trying to twist Tashi’s words to manipulate he was clearly being petty but I also think there’s some truth to his statement of not wanting Patrick to get hurt. He is his friend first but he also knows him (the same intrinsic way that Patrick knows Art) and how his friend will be able to bounce back from any relationship because Art truly doesn’t think these two are that serious (blinded by Patrick’s history and his own feelings). So Patrick sees the manipulation for what it is.

(The fond look in his eye when Art isn’t looking. That man is in love your honor!!!!!)

Patrick knows Art was trying to manipulate him. He knows it and he likes it, encourages it even. He looks at him like he’s proud of Art. The fact that it mattered more to him that Art was actually being vocal about his own wants instead of repressing as he always did, even if it was through breaking him and his girlfriend up. He didn’t even see it as a threat because it never occurs to him that he could lose Tashi to Art (or vice versa) because at this point, he’s secure in his place within the triangle. But also reveals how insecure Art feels within that same triangle because of his perceived isolation.

#challengers

[cielrouge]

No because the funniest thing about tashi is that she knew from the beginning that art and patrick had a thing for each other and did not care. She said tennis was like a relationship, watched these guys make out, and immediately pit them in a tennis match against each other. Like girl was not in denail or had any reservations. She literally gives a shit about tennis and only tennis and goddammit if patrick and art are going to play their best against each other for the first time in years she was going to enjoy it because why not its good fucking tennis. Its the most autistic girl in the world vs the guy she hates being into because he wont submit to her vs the guy she lives vicariously through because really all she ever wanted was to play tennis and fucking hell if watching these two guys face off against each other was going to get her that thrill again she will own it. Literally her pets (affectionate).

#challengers #challengers spoilers

[cielrouge]

i think one of the best subtleties of challengers is we all think art has matured because he got what he wanted - tashi and fame - and tashi and patrick are still immature teens but art hasn’t! he’s still a stunted adult, a literal teenager in the body of an adult who puts on this facade of maturity and wisdom to hide the fact that he’s deeply hurting inside because he does not want to be perceived as childish or immature, he does not want people to know he still ruminates over being the second choice lurking in the shadows of patrick and tashi - because even as an adult he still is. he can’t exist with tashi and he can’t exist without and so he becomes this blank nothingness and does what she says to feel something - approved, desired - so he does not become the bitter and jealous child that broke up tashi and patrick and ultimately led to tashi injuring herself. he is literally nothing more than tashi’s partner (as she is to him too) and has to pretend he’s okay with that so he doesn’t lose everything he’s built like he did when he was 18 and in love with his best friend and his best friend’s girlfriend.

#challengers #challengers spoilers

[cielrouge]

Why do I not see people talking about how angry Patrick got when Tashi asked him to throw the game??? How insulted he was on behalf of Art, that Tashi no longer believed in his own ability to beat him??? How he saw nothing wrong with her fucking him but that he drew the line at cheating Art out of a fair win?? What about the difference in how he reacted when Art asked the same from him vs when Tashi asked ????

#challengers #challengers spoilers

[cielrouge]

Before the boys and the audience meet Tashi she's wearing her hair in a 2-strand twist because the story has just been about the two boys so far. Then they all meet each other while her hair is down and then she wears her hair in a 3-strand braid

That's p much all you need to know about the movie Challengers

#challengers

[cielrouge]

Now I know we don’t all agree on who Lily’s father is, and that’s fine. But thinking about her being Patrick’s and…

Art guessing (knowing in his gut) that something happened in Atlanta and it might’ve been the last time he saw Patrick as well

Seeing Lily and seeing the little things she did that reminded Art of Patrick and Tashi’s sick to her stomach but Art loves her for it

Loves her mischievous spirit, her open affection. Her love of hotel rooms, a wanderer’s soul that Art knows is Patrick and he treasures every part of it because it is the only thing he has of his ex-(unrequited lover) best friend

When Tashi leaves to go to Patrick that night, Art knows and he lets her. He doesn’t sleep in their bed (it doesn’t feel like theirs anymore) and goes to Lily instead. He finds comfort in knowing though Patrick may have Tashi, Art has a piece of them both with him, the best parts of them.

#challengers #challengers spoilers