My quick rating – 5.5/10. HIM comes dressed like a prestige horror thriller, blending sports mythology, cult dynamics, and celebrity worship into one glossy package. Director Justin Tipping clearly knows how to frame a shot — this thing is gorgeous to look at, even if some scenes are so dark I thought my TV was dying. But while there’s no shortage of style, the substance struggles to keep pace.
The story follows Cameron Cade (Tyriq Withers), a rising football star whose career is derailed by a brutal head injury caused by a fan attack. Just when things look hopeless, his idol — legendary eight-time championship quarterback Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans) — swoops in like a benevolent messiah and offers to personally rebuild him at his secluded training compound. That compound also happens to house Isaiah’s influencer wife, Elsie (Julia Fox), whose vague job seems to be drifting ominously through the background while wearing expensive silk.
The training is split into themed days — Day 1: Fun, Day 2: Poise, Day 3: Leadership, and so on — which gives the movie a nice chaptered structure. But knowing this is a horror film, that “Fun” doesn’t last long. By day two, the vibe is already getting weird. By day five, it’s cult-adjacent. And by day six? “Sacrifice.” That’s never a good sign.
Cameron should’ve probably caught on sooner that something was wrong — between Isaiah insisting on reviewing game tape alone every night like a vampire doing spreadsheets, Elsie calling “management meetings” that feel like rehearsals for a ritual sacrifice, and the general dreamlike haze of the compound, red flags were everywhere. Often the film slips into full-on dream-state sequences, which makes for a trippy mood but occasionally blurs the line between intentional tension and narrative confusion. Half the time, I wasn’t sure if what I was watching was real or a metaphor. The other half, I was waiting for something to actually happen.
Thankfully, when things do finally go off the rails, the payoff comes in the form of a bloody, satisfying finale that almost single-handedly boosted my score. The film’s metaphor — wealthy powerbrokers feeding off athletes like livestock — isn’t subtle. Equating the NFL to a satanic cult is both on-the-nose and undeniably entertaining.
Performance-wise, everyone shows up. Withers delivers a strong lead, Wayans is magnetic and menacing in a way we don’t often get to see from him, and Jim Jefferies pops in with a surprisingly fitting role that I didn’t know I needed. The score absolutely slaps, the atmosphere is thick, and the direction is confident.
But here’s the problem: there’s just not much story beneath the sheen. HIM has big ideas about fame, exploitation, and hero worship, but it skims the surface instead of digging in. It’s a slow burn that never quite catches fire until the very end, leaving most of its potential untapped.
Don’t go in expecting a Jordan Peele-style social thriller, despite the marketing trying to nudge it that way. HIM isn’t bad by any means, just frustratingly hollow. A beautifully wrapped box with not much inside.
