{"id":70542,"date":"2025-09-18T00:14:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-18T00:14:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/70542\/"},"modified":"2025-09-18T00:14:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-18T00:14:07","slug":"him-unleashes-a-football-horror-movie-for-first-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/70542\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Him’ unleashes a football horror movie for first time"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"play\"<\/p>\n

Tyriq Withers shares how Jordan Palmer helped him become ‘Him’<\/p>\n

Tyriq Withers reveals how Jordan Palmer helped him transform into a quarterback for the football horror movie “Him.”<\/p>\n

Entertain This!<\/p>\n

In a horror movie, the sight of a leg being broken and the bone sticking out might be squirm-inducing but not out of bonds. It might even be played for a dark laugh.<\/p>\n

Now think about that same scene in the context of a sporting event. Much worse, right? In fact, it’s unsettling on multiple levels.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s what director and cowriter Justin Tipping taps into with \u201cHim\u201d<\/a> (in theaters Sept. 19<\/a>), a film that combines football and psychological terror<\/a> for the first time.<\/p>\n

\u201cBody horror is inherent in the game,\u201d Tipping says. \u201cThe thing that was most exciting about the project was realizing there were no comps. That’s how you know you’re going the right direction because it is uncharted territory.\u201d<\/p>\n

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What is ‘Him’ about?<\/p>\n

Produced by Jordan Peele, \u201cHim\u201d stars Tyriq Withers as Cameron Cade, a top-flight pro prospect who the San Antonio Saviors are considering to be their next franchise quarterback. He\u2019s invited by the team’s legendary passer \u2013\u00a0and Cam\u2019s childhood idol \u2013 Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans) to come to his remote compound to see if the kid is a worthy heir apparent. The \u201ctraining camp\u201d that unfolds is a bizarre and bonkers situation that tests Cam physically and psychologically.<\/p>\n

“They wanted an unhinged performance, and I was able to unhinge and have the freedom to create a really twisted, fun, sadistic, sarcastic antihero,” Wayans says.<\/p>\n

While soccer was a passion for Tipping until college, he leaned on Withers for gridrion authenticity. The 27-year-old former walk-on receiver for Florida State<\/a> was impressed with the respect Tipping paid to details, he says. \u201cI was blown away with the challenging of what a normal football film room would look like.”<\/p>\n

The director also wanted to capture the punishing aspects of sport. There\u2019s the gruesome leg injury in the opening scene of the movie, and while NFL cameras cut away at that sort of gore in real life, Tipping doesn\u2019t. \u201cWe get to force an audience to see it,\u201d he says. Every time, Tipping would make \u201cas brutal of a choice that we could, not holding back any punches.\u201d<\/p>\n

How ‘Him’ mines the inherent body horror in football<\/p>\n

\u201cHim\u201d employs a lot of strange and unsettling visuals as the movie touches on fandom and the morally questionable inner workings of sports teams. The most visceral scenes, however, happen on the practice field, where Isaiah puts Cam through his paces.<\/p>\n

There are some lighter moments, like Isaiah screaming into Cam’s face then booping him on the nose with a finger. “There’s nothing creepier than that,” Wayans says with a laugh. “That would scare me so much more than if they pulled out a gun.”<\/p>\n

But for the darker aspects, Tipping was intent on putting a horror movie spin on \u201cthe most violent things\u201d you\u2019d find with a real football team. In one bloody sequence, Cam has to do a speed drill, getting a pass off to a receiver in a certain amount of time, and if he doesn\u2019t, another player gets a ball rocketed into his face by a passing machine. Cam struggles, and the other guy’s face becomes a unsightly mess.<\/p>\n

\u201cGuys do some weird, crazy hazing and, and I’ve heard so many stories about what they do to the rookies,\u201d Tipping says, adding that scene came about pondering \u201cthe most ritualistic game\u201d they could show.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s almost gaslighting Cameron Cade this entire time. He’s not sure what’s real and what’s fake, as well as the audience.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another bone-breaking moment comes during hitting drills, and as players smack each other, Tipping flips to an X-ray view that shows the brain and other internal parts of bodies being jostled around in shocking fashion. That was inspired by watching Los Angeles Rams games in person but also experiencing concussions himself.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese guys talk about every weekend is basically getting into a car crash and recovering,\u201d Tipping says. \u201cEveryone’s hit so hard,\u201d but \u201cunless there’s blood, common spectators are like, \u2018Yeah, sure. Whatever. Get back up and keep going.\u2019 How do you show that invisible killer?\u201d<\/p>\n

It was important for Tipping to serve both football fanatics and horror fiends with “Him,” yet he also wanted to appeal to mainstream movie lovers who understand the concept of an aging GOAT athlete not being willing to retire yet.<\/p>\n

A large theme of the movie is exploring \u201cthe psychology of what it takes to be somebody like a Tom Brady, a LeBron James,” Tipping says. “What does it actually take to be the greatest at what you do?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tyriq Withers shares how Jordan Palmer helped him become ‘Him’ Tyriq Withers reveals how Jordan Palmer helped him…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70543,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[263],"tags":[48753,840,365,18,117,1237,2129,48756,22,23842,48755,27938,19,17,526,5718,1382,6004,327,18270,24016,714,5,2530,713,731,5711,48754,132,13562,716],"class_list":{"0":"post-70542","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-genre","9":"tag-affiliate","10":"tag-arts","11":"tag-eire","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-films","14":"tag-florida","15":"tag-florida-state-seminoles-football","16":"tag-football","17":"tag-horror","18":"tag-horror-genre","19":"tag-horror-films","20":"tag-ie","21":"tag-ireland","22":"tag-local","23":"tag-local-affiliate-arts-u0026-entertainment","24":"tag-movie","25":"tag-movie-reference","26":"tag-movies","27":"tag-national","28":"tag-national-sports","29":"tag-negative","30":"tag-news","31":"tag-nfl","32":"tag-overall","33":"tag-overall-negative","34":"tag-reference","35":"tag-seminoles","36":"tag-sports","37":"tag-state","38":"tag-u0026"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70542"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70542\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}