Most of us have, at one time or another, dreamed of what it would be like to be a superstar, but Hollywood usually reminds us there’s always a dark side to fame. The trailer for HIM, the latest horror from Jordan Peele’s Monkeypaw Productions, makes a pretty good case that wishing for football stardom is… well, a bit of a monkey’s paw. From the intense pressure of chasing greatness to the actual physical toll the game takes on the body—not to mention all the weird, cult-like shit going down—director Justin Tipping makes being a football star look pretty scary.
HIM stars actual former former college wide-receiver Tyriq Withers as “Cameron Cade, a rising-star quarterback who has devoted his life, and identity, to football. On the eve of professional football’s annual scouting Combine, Cam is attacked by an unhinged fan and suffers a potentially career-ending brain trauma,” the synopsis reads. “Just when all seems lost, Cam receives a lifeline when his hero, Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans), a legendary eight-time Championship quarterback and cultural megastar, offers to train Cam at Isaiah’s isolated compound that he shares with his celebrity influencer wife, Elsie White (Julia Fox). But as Cam’s training accelerates, Isaiah’s charisma begins to curdle into something darker, sending his protégé down a disorienting rabbit hole that may cost him more than he ever bargained for.”
The HIM trailer trades in blood and quasi-religious imagery: We see Cameron disoriented at a long, Last Supper-esque table; he seems to encounter some devils in the desert and gets assaulted by a satanic figure on the field; and at the end of the trailer he raises both arms in a mimicry of Christ on the cross. But he’s standing in the middle of a pentagram when he does it, so the effect is, shall we say, unholy. You’ve probably heard football players thanking God above all else after winning the Super Bowl; it looks like Cameron’s blessings will come from a very different source. HIM premieres in theaters on September 19.
