Written by Ronald Bronstein And Josh Safdie
Directed by Josh Safdie
Marty: "It's every man for himself where I come from. That's just how I grew up."
I avoided this movie for a while and I'm regretful that I did. Did I really want to watch a two and a half hour movie about a sport that I don't really care about? It turned out that I did.
Timothee Chalamet might have run one of the worst Oscar campaigns in recent years but I have to admit that the reason why this movie worked so well was because of how bloody good he was throughout. It's certainly a career defining performance that could've bagged him the win had he played his cards better.
In this movie, he took on the role of Marty Mauser (loosely based on Marty Reiser). Marty was ambitious enough in his chosen field that he stole money from the shoe shop he was working, tried to avoid interacting with his mother, Rebecca (Fran Drescher), pissing off the wrong people and sleeping with the wrong women.
Two of his most troublesome relationships were with attached women. There was his childhood friend, Rachel Mizler (Odessa A'zion). She was married to Ira (Emory Cohen) but that didn't stop Marty from getting her pregnant or the two of them being involved in a dog napping scheme. On the other hand, there's something rather nice about Marty being there to meet his child at the very end of the film.
Marty's relationship with older actress Kay Stone (Gwyneth Paltrow) seemed a bit more transactional. He was able to give her some good advice but he wasn't above trying to steal from her when desperate. Marty's antics also incurred the wrath of Kay's husband, Milton Rockwell (Kevin O'Leary).
As for the table tennis scenes themselves, they were fine. Marty had the talent and moved up along the ranks to get to the championship. He also had to humiliate himself by letting Milton spank him in front of others but at least he managed to end things by winning the damn thing.
- Other noteworthy performances include David Mamet, Fred Hechinger, Sandra Bernhard and an uncredited voice role from Robert Pattinson.
- Josh Safdie had been a fan of table tennis since childhood. Marty Reiser's autobiography laid the groundwork for this film.
- Standout music: Tears For Tears Everybody Wants To Rule The World.
- Chronology: 1952 New York City with the championship set in Tokyo.
Although it did seem somewhat overhyped, I ended up enjoying Marty Supreme a lot more than I thought I would. Timothee Chalamet delivered one of the strongest career performances and the rest of the cast didn't slouch either.
Rating: 8 out of 10
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