Marty Mauser (Timothée Chalamet) is the kind of guy I’d call a “little shit.” A scrawny, smirky white boy with a unibrow and a peach-fuzz little mustache, he exudes a confidence and cockiness far beyond his station. You see, he says he’s going to be a big star—a champion—so he should get the nicest suite at the hotel during a major international tournament. And you know what? See that beautiful, aging Hollywood star in the lobby? Well, she should sleep with him because, you know, he’s basically famous already. And you, mister businessman? You should sponsor his greatness and pay for it all.
In other words, Marty is super annoying, but his determined belief in his own greatness somehow gets him halfway there.
But I’m jumping ahead. It’s the 1950s, and Marty is a New York City shoe salesman who has knocked up his on-again, off-again girlfriend Rachel (Odessa A’zion). The major tournament that he believes is his destiny happens to be an international table tennis championship taking place in Europe.
Wait… back up… table tennis? You mean ping-pong? Yes, indeed.
Marty is good, though—good at ping-pong in the way the Harlem Globetrotters are good at basketball (though he thinks highlighting showmanship over competition is demeaning to athletes). He knows he should be competing at the international level; he just has to talk, hustle, or swindle his way there.
Yes, Marty Supreme is technically a sports movie… but it’s like a sports movie made by Martin Scorsese. It’s frenetic, funny, and surprisingly violent. Marty’s home base is a gritty New York City, with sketchy basement clubs filled with extras who look like they’ve lived and smoked there for decades. It’s a world where a guy can be a ping-pong hustler, making enough cash by “playing” unsuspecting pool-hall joes so convincingly that he and his partner in crime (Tyler Okonma, aka Tyler, the Creator) have to bolt for their lives after the con goes sideways.
Surprisingly (or maybe not) Marty worms his way upward, seducing and exasperating the previously mentioned Hollywood star (Gwyneth Paltrow), working the nerves and wallet of her rich husband (Kevin O’Leary), and even dodging the fists and guns of a gangster (Abel Ferrara). All roads lead to Marty’s singular destiny: a rematch in Japan against a rival superstar table tennis champion (Koto Kawaguchi).
Marty Supreme is absolutely not what I expected (though having expectations for a film about a table tennis champ was unprecedented for me). It’s fast, funny, and wildly unpredictable. Gawking at the press junkets, Marty’s cockiness seems to have rubbed off on Chalamet—but he is really good in this.
Writer/director Josh Safdie (this time without filmmaking partner brother Benny Safdie) continues the frenetic style that defined the Safdie Brothers’ collaborations Good Time and Uncut Gems. And this may be the best film yet stamped with the Safdie name. Marty Supreme is hilarious, weird, wild, and surprisingly action-packed. In short, it is supremely entertaining.
