Playing a ping-pong standout with swag, Timothée Chalamet manages to top last year’s Oscar-nominated performance as Bob Dylan.
Timothée Chalamet stars in first trailer for ‘Marty Supreme’
Timothée Chalamet plays a ruthless sleazeball in hot pursuit of table tennis glory in the anxious new movie “Marty Supreme.”
Timothée Chalamet’s new movie “Marty Supreme” arrives in theaters nationwide on Christmas Day.Director Josh Safdie’s genre-busting sports drama is rated R.The young actor deserved an Oscar for playing Bob Dylan and might win one for “Marty Supreme.”
Sweaty and self-confident, Timothée Chalamet swings a table tennis paddle like a madman in “Marty Supreme,” an unconventionally masterful sports flick that remarkably pulls off a reverse underdog story.
As much as he deserved a best actor Oscar for his multifaceted performance as Bob Dylan in last year’s “A Complete Unknown,” Chalamet manages to outdo himself as Marty Mauser, a 23-year-old ping-pong wizard and punk needing (and mostly getting) a comeuppance. Director Josh Safdie’s globetrotting, genre-busting comedy thriller (★★★½ out of four; rated R; in select theaters now, nationwide Dec. 25) is a proudly oddball period movie that boasts throwback elements but leans timeless in its unlikely hero’s journey.
And while Marty harbors big dreams, equally sizable are the disastrous situations he finds himself in constantly.
In New York City circa 1952, Marty works at his uncle’s shoe shop and bides his time before he can take his shot at ping-pong glory. He tells people it’s only a matter of time “until I’m staring at you from the cover of a Wheaties box.” Nobody, not even those closest to him, respects his goals or hustle, but no matter, because Marty has blind ambition. His selfishness affects not only himself but everyone around him, usually leaving a path of destruction in his wake.
He definitely fosters a love-hate relationship within his own sporting community. The entitled Marty swaggers into the British Open thinking he’ll wipe the floor with everyone, and he even hits on a fading movie star, Kay Stone (Gwyneth Paltrow), who’s staying at his hotel. But instead of becoming a champ, Marty gets his butt kicked by deaf Japanese opponent Koto Endo (real-life player Koto Kawaguchi).
After fuming and throwing a trash can in the aftermath, Marty falls into a mental spiral. When he returns from a world tour with the Harlem Globetrotters as a halftime trick-shot artist, our foolish hero faces a series of challenges, starting with the fact that Marty’s married childhood friend Rachel (a fabulous Odessa A’zion) is about to have his baby. He also needs to scrounge up enough money to get to Tokyo and have a rematch with his rival Endo, which is easier said than done as his cons start to catch up with him.
He gets chased by cops, swindles the wrong ping-pong goobers and becomes embroiled in a canine extortion scheme. Even his closest friends start to see how he’s a double-dealing menace.
Like “Uncut Gems,” Safdie’s acclaimed film alongside brother Benny, “Marty Supreme’ is an exposed nerve of a sports movie. There’s anxiety to be had from Marty’s various scams going terribly awry to the well-crafted, white-knuckle table tennis scenes. And thanks to Chalamet’s raw charm and gumption, it’s hard to stay out of his corner: You actually begin to root for the petulant Marty once he starts to act like a grown-up for a change.
Safdie has surrounded him with a strange yet stellar supporting cast. “Shark Tank” businessman Kevin O’Leary is surprisingly good as Kay’s husband and Marty’s ink business-mogul nemesis, while Tyler Okonma (aka hip-hop star Tyler, The Creator) matches Chalamet’s magnetic energy as Marty’s fellow hustler and best friend. Add in Fran Drescher, Penn Jillette (of Penn & Teller fame) and NBA legend George Gervin, and this flick seems to be a raison d’etre for that spiffy new casting Oscar.
“Marty” is supremely stylistic, especially in its music. It inexplicably uses as much 1980s new wave as it does ‘50s sounds: Needle drops feature Tears for Fears and New Order as well as Fats Domino and Perry Como, with a side of Beethoven. (There’s a scene involving a sperm with Marty’s same competitive streak speeding to an egg set to Alphaville’s “Forever Young.”)
The movie also touches on a changing postwar culture in which Marty is the cocky American looking to conquer the world and Endo becomes the national symbol for a Japan building back after the bomb. Their inevitable big rematch has some end-of-“Rocky IV” vibes.
Sure, you’ll have to navigate several cinematic panic attacks, but “Marty Supreme” delivers a quintessential ping-pong movie cooler than anyone ever thought possible.
Why is ‘Marty Supreme’ rated R?
The ping-pong period epic “Marty Supreme,” starring Timothée Chalamet and Gwyneth Paltrow, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association “for language throughout, sexual content, some violent content/bloody images and nudity.”