Marty Supreme Review: Josh Safdie and Timothee Chalamet have made the film of the year
PLOT: In the 1950s, a young ping-pong player, Marty Mauser (Timothée Chalamet), hustles everyone in sight to achieve his goal of becoming the world’s most famous ping-pong player.
REVIEW: We’ve been lucky this year in that A24 has released two movies from the Safdie Brothers, with the two splitting to pursue their own passion projects. Benny Safdie’s The Smashing Machine was quiet and contemplative, whereas Josh Safdie’s Marty Supreme is anything but. A slam-bang, virtuoso piece of filmmaking that’s very much in the vein of Uncut Gems and Good Time, Marty Supreme—for this critic—is the film of the year and the most exciting 2.5 hours I spent in a movie theater this year. All for a movie about table tennis!
Indeed, ping-pong has never been as exciting as it is in Josh Safdie’s movie, but it’s no more a movie about table tennis than Uncut Gems is a movie specifically about diamonds. It simply provides the backdrop for a character study, with Timothée Chalamet giving the performance of his life as Marty Mauser, a born hustler. Were it not ping-pong, he’d be hustling something else—he just happens to have a particular skill once a paddle is put in his hands. Always looking for the next score, with him not giving an iota of thought to the wreckage he causes in his wake, Marty should become an iconic role for Chalamet, who gives off the vibe of a young De Niro or Pacino in the starring role. Wire-thin, with a unibrown, b.t.m (bad teenage moustache) and always on the make, the fast-talking Marty has never met anyone he couldn’t hustle, and Chalamet has the charisma to make you believe it.
The wreckage we watch Marty leave in his wake is impressive, with him unable to stop screwing up people’s lives, even if it’s unintentional. Literally in the first five minutes of the film, we watch him knock up Rachel (Odessa A’zion), a girl from his tight-knit Jewish neighbourhood (with us actually seeing the moment of conception Look Who’s Talking-style) who—natch—happens to be married. Everyone he runs into gets left with some kind of wreckage, including a faded film star (Gwyneth Paltrow in a meaty role) he seduces, her powerful husband (Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary), a taxi-driver pal (Tyler, the Creator), and more. No one walks out of Marty’s life unscathed.
Yet, for all his faults you can’t help but admire Marty and his constant hustle, and it’s a tribute to Chalamet’s performance and Safdie’s storytelling skills that you can’t help but want to see Marty get ahead. Safdie directs the film in his typically propulsive way, with the vibe being that it’s set in the fifties, but scored by Daniel Lopatin and soundtracked like it was made in 1988. Lopatin’s score is evocative of Tangerine Dream, which is appropriate as the film seems heavily influenced by Risky Business, while choice New Wave cuts from Tears for Fears, New Order, and Public Image Ltd. fill the soundtrack.
Like Uncut Gems, the supporting cast is highly idiosyncratic, with A’zion, who’s currently appearing on the talked-about HBO comedy I Love L.A., terrific as Rachel, the girl who can’t help but want Marty despite his faults. In her own way, she’s just as much of a hustler as Marty, yet like Chalamet we can’t help but like her. Tyler, the Creator also totally vanishes into his role as a cab driver who has the misfortune of being Marty’s best friend, whom he drags along on his harebrained schemes, while O’Leary is effective in a role that seems patterned on his own Shark Tank persona. Paltrow will also draw buzz for a pretty bold, ego-less performance as an easily manipulated, aging actress who proves to be a good mark for Marty, while one of Safdie’s biggest influences, director Abel Ferrara, has a good role as a low-rent gangster tied into some of the film’s most shocking moments.
Through it all, Safdie’s command of the audience is impressive, with him making the film such an intense experience I felt like I was in the midst of a drug-fuelled binge while watching it. He keeps your pulse pounding, and it’s the kind of movie one is tempted to immediately revisit after the credits roll. For me, it’s the movie of the year, and if film as a form seems to be dying off, at least there are guys like Safdie around who still deserve their place in the pantheon of great directors.
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