‘Him’ Review: Justin Tipping’s Football Horror Suffers from Chronic Cinematic Encephalopathy [C-]
Football sure is scary. To those of us not bought into the sport, the idea of the world’s biggest bodies slamming into each other at full force sounds about as enticing as watching a car smash into a concrete wall. A multi-billion dollar empire built around turning physical actions that would otherwise lead to a swift voyage to the emergency room into entertainment is a borderline dystopian concept. Him, the new – as Wikipedia dizzyingly classifies it – “supernatural psychological sports horror film” that takes the inherent physical trauma of American football and makes it visual. It’s not a huge leap to turn an exploration of the sport into something akin to a body horror film, but Him has so much more on its mind than merely making audiences wince at the sight and sound of cracking bones and slamming skulls. But like the thoughts of a concussed athlete, the film’s ideas are so scrambled and told in such perplexing a manner that in the end, it gets away from any points it may have been trying to make and devolves into pure nonsense. Like an athlete bragging about his supposed greatness while leading a losing team, the film is all flash and no substance.
Him follows Cam Cade (Tyriq Withers), a promising young quarterback hoping to get drafted by his favorite team, the San Antonio Saviors. He grew up idolizing Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans), the Saviors’ legendary QB who led the team to eight championship wins. Things are looking good for Cam, but right before the draft, he’s attacked by an unknown assailant, leading to a concussion and a shiny set of staples in his head. As he recovers, Cam is offered the kind of opportunity he’s always dreamed of: Isaiah invites him to his remote home to train and, hopefully, receive his blessing to move into Isaiah’s position with the Saviors. Going against his doctor’s orders, Cam heads out for Isaiah’s compound and immediately finds himself thrust into a bizarre regimen that will push him to, and far past, his limits.
Unsurprisingly, we follow Cam closely throughout the film, with the audience learning about Isaiah and his unorthodox ways as the main character does. Withers provides the necessary sympathy in order for the film to maintain its curiously inviting energy. We need to want to see what will happen to him and how it’ll happen, and when the screenplay neglects to craft a compelling, logical journey for its main character, it falls on the actor to engage viewers. Luckily, Withers has the goods. He works a close-up effectively and manages to find variety in Cam’s many surprised, astonished, and agog reactions to the endless kooky-krazy happenings.
Wayans is similarly magnetic, but in a totally unhinged manner that makes it impossible to look away from him. Like so many star athletes, he’s incredibly charming, selling the idea that Isaiah is a legend to both his devoted followers within his compound and the faceless, anonymous legion of football fans that fill the Savior’s stadium. Wayans plays Isaiah as a personified devilish grin – from the start, it’s clear why Cam is drawn to him, even if Isaiah is very obviously hiding (or even scarier, not even trying to hide) something malicious and unwell in his being and in his practices.
It’s apparent that something is off the second that Cam steps foot on Isaiah’s property, robbing the film of any sense of mystery. It’s as if the entire film is set in the third act of Get Out or Rosemary’s Baby or any other film about a hapless innocent thrust into a world of evil wrongdoers. And Cam clearly knows this, so why does he stay? The promise of glory and fame is plainly alluring, but the film tries to explain that Cam pursues his athletic dream in large part because of the influence of his late father. But in Tipping’s screenplay, co-written with Zack Akers & Skip Bronkie (creators of the sci-fi crime series Limetown), this is merely told to us, practically in passing, robbing the main character of a real sense of purpose. At Isaiah White’s football school, things start weird and get weirder, to the point where the film becomes a seemingly unending series of strange, off-putting revelations and rituals that Cam discovers once a day during his week-long training. With no sense of mystery, it’s hard for the film to maintain an organic sense of propulsion, putting all the responsibility of keeping the audience invested on the lead actor’s not-unimpressive shoulders.
To tell Cam’s nightmarish story, director Justin Tipping employs a whole host of flashy techniques and filmmaking choices to make Him as constantly disorienting as possible. This effectively puts us in the character’s headspace, but by the time the film presents its fourth or fifth fantastical, aggressively chopped-up montage filled with surreal imagery, focus shifts, and vibrant colors, it has a numbing effect. Indeed, the final such mishmash of briefly-flashing images and disturbing sights is supposed to be so shocking that it leads to a breakthrough for Cam, but this climactic effect is severely muted by the fact that we’ve seen such things over and over in the 80ish minutes that came before.
Still, Tipping’s directorial instincts are impressive, when removed from the film’s context. He’s crafted a slick film, edited to within an inch of its life and filled with smartly composed shots. Cam’s entrance into Isaiah’s foreboding estate is especially well-captured. Here, Tipping really makes the audience feel both the expansiveness (and thus, Isaiah’s implied wealth and power) of the compound and also how remote it is, ensuring that Cam will have no easy escape from whatever he’s about to encounter. The varied, well-selected sound design further draws the audience into Cam’s headspace, switching between overwhelming volume and suddenly muted moments.
But by the time Him reaches its truly ridiculous final sequence, it’s hard to muster up even a forced feeling of shock. The film makes the choice to not be clear about what Cam is actually experiencing versus what’s happening inside his head, which may help viewers to empathize with his frightening misadventure, but it also makes it impossible to grasp what we’re supposed to truly fear. Is the threat human? Is it supernatural? A mix of the two? Who’s to say? The film seems to want to invoke such confusing feelings, but without a solid foundation of reality, Him separates itself so far from any foothold of relatability. Instead, it invokes a response that mirrors the cheeky emoticon drawn on the label of the mysterious shots that Isaiah’s doctor repeatedly administers to Cam: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
Grade: C-
Universal Pictures will release Him only in theaters on September 19.
He currently resides in Chicago and is a proud member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics. He also writes and podcasts for Next Best Picture and co-hosts his own podcast “Halloweeners: A Horror Movie Podcast.” You can follow him on Twitter, Letterboxd, and Bluesky @codymonster91
- Interview: How the Hair and Makeup Wizards Behind ‘Weapons’ Created a Lasting Icon in Aunt Gladys - November 10, 2025
- ‘Palestine 36’ Review: Annemarie Jacir’s Drama is a Largely Untold Tale of Early Palestinian Struggle [C+] CIFF - October 29, 2025
- ‘Whitetail’ Review: From Nanouk Leopold’s Frustratingly Imbalanced Irish Drama Emerges a Star-Making Performance from Natasha O’Keeffe [C+] CIFF - October 26, 2025
‘Jay Kelly,’ ‘Hamnet,’ ‘Pluribus,’ ‘Task’ and More on AFI’s Top 10 Films and Television of 2025 Lists 
‘Frankenstein’ to Receive Visionary Honor from Palm Springs International Film Awards 
Robert Yeoman to be Honored with American Society of Cinematographers’ Lifetime Achievement Award 
National Board of Review: ‘One Battle After Another’ Tops in Film, Director, Actor, Supporting Actor; Netflix Lands Four in Top 10