There’s an inflection point in the year for every critic when a cold realization dawns during a screening. This could be the worst film I’ve seen in 2025, and it’s only getting more intolerable. We still have three months left to go. Anything’s possible, but it’d be astonishing to top the train wreck that’s Him. The Jordan Peele-produced football horror thriller bashes the senses with gruesome imagery, mind-numbing strobe effects and shaky cinematography in an ugly narrative. Him has an admittedly decent premise, but the scattershot execution and inane script loaded with racial epithets grates to exasperation. There’s so much to dislike here.
Him opens with a young Cameron Cade (Austin Pulliam) watching his favorite football team, the San Antonio Saviors, and its star quarterback Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans) in a close game. Cheers turn to screams of horror as Isaiah suffers a hideous injury. Cam turns away from the screen, but his father (Don Benjamin) forces him to watch the ghastly display. A montage then follows of Isaiah returning to greatness shortly after, as he wins eight league MVPs and numerous championships for the Saviors. What should have been career-ending spurs Isaiah to the heights of fame and success. Cam’s father preaches “no pain, no gain” as a way to motivate his impressionable son.
Him
0.5
/5
- Release Date
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September 18, 2025
- Director
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Justin Tipping
- Writers
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Justin Tipping, Zack Akers, Skip Bronkie
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Tyriq Withers
Benny Mathis
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Marlon Wayans
Connor Dane
Cam (Tyriq Withers) grows up to become an impressive athlete that dominates college football. He’s widely considered to be the number one pick in the draft before a strange attack leaves him injured before the combine. His slimy agent (Tim Heidecker) tells the media that Cam will be fine. He’s a star and will recover to dominate professional football. A hurt and wary Cam is stunned when Isaiah White offers to train him for a week at his remote facility. Isaiah has been the Saviors quarterback for an incredible 20 years. Who better than a living legend to help Cam reclaim his game?
Him’s blistering assault on the eyes and ears begins in the opening frame and doesn’t stop until the credits roll 96 minutes later. The film is an avalanche of quick edits intercut with bizarre visuals that are meant to be jarring and unsettling. Instead, what you get is a stream of weirdness and confusion that ramps up along with the grotesque violence. The onslaught is accompanied by a cacophony of discordant sounds and thumping music of every variety. It’s akin to a radio being tossed around a rave as scantily clad women and half-naked, muscular men gyrate like the floor’s electrified. “What the heck am I watching?,” repeats in your brain as the football torture escalates into a hellish Hieronymus Bosch painting with pom poms.
Tyriq Withers as Cam
Wayans spends the film spewing N-bombs, cursing and yelling like a drill sergeant at a boot camp for the hearing impaired. Isaiah’s brutal training and hazing regime is introduced with different titles that depict each day’s session. But the words mean nothing and don’t logically correlate to what you’re seeing. It’s as if the screenwriters used the same flawed methodology for the random imagery. It’s also clear within seconds of Cam’s arrival that Isaiah has zero intention of making him a better player. His nonstop berating and graphic physical abuse doesn’t jibe with being helpful. The question then arises: Why would Cam put up with any of this garbage?
Director and co-screenwriter Justin Tipping, primarily known for his episodic television work (The Chi, Black Monday, Dear White People), wants the audience to believe that Cam will do anything to surpass Isaiah as the Greatest Of All Time. That means getting beaten to a bloody pulp, watching others be equally subjugated and getting weird injections without explanation is all worth it in pursuit of the ultimate goal. Cam must then be a masochist to embrace Isaiah’s barbaric sadism. He doesn’t question Isaiah’s strategy despite numerous disturbing occurrences that would have any sane person racing for the exit. Instead, it’s not until the climax that Cam realizes there’s something amiss about his situation.
Bleached Eyebrows Time
Him is utterly devoid of subtlety, so Isaiah and the Saviors aren’t mysterious about their affiliations. The facility is covered with demonic, pagan and satanic symbols. It could be that Cam is a devout devil worshiper. But that would actually make sense, and thus has no business in this film. Isaiah’s wife (Julia Fox) — complete with bleached eyebrows — and quack, pill-popping doctor (Jim Jefferies) round out Isaiah’s crew of minions in one-note performances that further strain the audience’s patience. Withers is the only character that plays the role straight, but he’s basically a punching bag with shredded abs.
Him’s barrage wouldn’t be so tiresome if there were any legitimate scares. Tipping scores a couple of jump-scare points, but those aren’t enough to balance out everything bad about this movie. An opportunity was squandered to thoughtfully criticize parents, coaches and athletes who push children over the edge in dangerous sports. What we get is a jumble of awful that’s just a slog to sit through. There’s also the gimmick of these one-word titles; Peele has built them into his own brand, but the marketing strategy takes hit when the films aren’t living up to expectations.
Him is produced by Monkeypaw Productions and will be released theatrically on September 19th from Universal Pictures.
