In the American version of football, ex-New England Patriots and former Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady arguably holds the title of “GOAT” (Greatest Of All Time), but in the non-real, in-film world of director Justin Tipping’s (Kicks) frustrating Him, that title belongs to Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans, giving a next-level performance to an undeserving role), a seemingly unstoppable, eight-time championship-winning quarterback for the fictional San Antonio Saviors.
Despite nearing the end of his playing days, White still represents the pinnacle of a league where mostly non-white bodies are sacrificed on the altar of commerce and entertainment. He, too, showcases the personal sacrifices required to excel in a competitive sport defined by its on-the-field brutality and, for most, shortened professional careers followed by decades filled with the long-term effects of participating in America’s favourite sport.
For Cameron Cade (Tyriq Withers), a college senior considered White’s heir apparent, his life has been programmed; first by his late father, then by the agents, managers, and various hangers-on, including parasitic family members, to make football not just his number one priority, but the only priority that matters. God and family are a distant second and third, respectively. It’s a path others have made for him, and if Cade retains his monk-like devotion to the art and craft of the quarterback position, personal and professional success will follow.
But then either a rabid fan dressed as a mythical figure or a malignant supernatural being waves an axe-like weapon at Cade’s cranium and almost steals his future before it’s truly begun. He survives the near-fatal encounter but with staples prominently displayed on the side of his head. There’s also the real risk that playing football again will lead to permanently debilitating brain damage and a premature exit from this mortal plane.
Still recovering from the attack, Cade decides to forego the league’s pre-draft, spring combine. Missing it potentially means dropping from the top of the draft to a later round or even to the bottom, but that’s where White, openly considering retirement, invites the woefully naive Cade to spend a week training at White’s private compound in the middle of the desert. He does so presumably to determine whether Cade has the necessary qualifications to become White’s chosen successor on the San Antonio team–if and when he retires.
Anyone who knows American football knows we’ve just stepped through the looking glass into a parallel dimension or universe. While Him might be set in a world where a professional league like the NFL exists, it has its own set of rules. Tipping and his co-screenwriters, Zack Akers and Skip Bronkie, don’t bother explaining them or how they differ from the NFL’s (e.g., how the in-film draft works, how White’s unconventional training methods or the drug cocktails he ingests regularly remain a secret to the outside world), but apparently, that would have taken too much effort.
Instead, the Jordan Peele-produced Him jumps headfirst into a hallucinatory mind-bang where the seemingly defenceless Cade allows White to gaslight him into increasingly extreme, self-destructive behaviour. A training run in the desert almost becomes fatal, a surprise attack by White’s bizarrely cultish followers on Cade while he’s in a sauna leaves the younger man briefly disturbed, but ultimately unfazed. In addition, White’s unexpected appearance in his bedroom one night leaves Cade unconcerned for his own personal safety. It’s all meant, of course, to signal Cade’s willingness to set aside whatever weakly developed morals or ethics he has and follow White wherever the latter leads.
Thematically muddled and visually overwrought, Him turns Cade into a bland, shirtless cypher who mutters sports cliches and never grows beyond childish, wide-eyed wonder at White’s bizarre behaviour or the risks to Cade’s own physical, emotional, or mental well-being. Like the film, Cade inhabits a one-dimensional, surface-deep character, doomed from the start to play a passive, reactive role in his own life. That passivity makes for a dull, unengaging character for Him’s first and second acts. An abrupt, underdeveloped about-face changes Cade’s ultimate fate, but it doesn’t transform him into the compelling character we wish he had been.
Presumably, Cade’s reactions (or lack thereof) are meant to signal the cult of personality/celebrity around White that essentially gives him a free pass to do and/or say anything he wants. He benefits from his professional success and the wealth that’s come his way courtesy of billionaire team owners, brand deals, and quite possibly, a not-quite figurative deal with the devil. There too, Him opts for obfuscation, not clarity. On its own, ambiguity can be a net positive storytelling wise, but here it betrays both a shortage of meaningful ideas and the unwillingness to explore whatever ideas it does weave into the underwhelming, forgettable result.
Him opened in theatres on September 19, via Universal Pictures.
