Marty Supreme begins with an extreme close-up of a sperm and concludes with the natural end result of insemination. In between is two and a half hours of loud and uncontrolled chaos that feel like nine months of pain.
Everything about Marty Supreme is maximalist. It is intended to aggravate and exhaust in equal measure. Some will undoubtedly swoon at the incessant barrage of attitude that pummels viewers from the very first frame onwards. Others, like myself, will question why we should care about someone as deplorable as Marty (Timothée Chalamet) when the film itself has no interest in developing his character.
Marty is a Ping-Pong hustler who believes he's destined for greatness. Everything and everyone else is an obstacle on his path to reach it. He works at a store in a job provided to him by his long-suffering family who fall over themselves to provide for Marty. This naturally isn't enough for the misunderstood genius, who proceeds to rob his uncle to pay for his trip to England, where he competes in the world championship tournament for table tennis.
There, he swindles the sports organization by installing himself at a fancy hotel and giving out interviews proclaiming his brilliance. He somehow charms a lonely aging actress, Kay (Gwyneth Paltrow), to sleep with him. At every turn, the world provides for him, even when all he deserves is a kick in the teeth.
Then the unthinkable happens and Marty loses. He isn't the best, and he proceeds to throw a tantrum while calling his opponent a cheater. Once more, the world provides an out for him and Marty gets a gig playing half-time shows for the Harlem Globetrotters. Once more, Marty whines his way into trouble as he proclaims himself better than the luxurious situation he's provided.
This is only the first half hour of the film. The following two full hours only compound the story with useless sub-plots and detours, none of which impress or enrich the experience. Most of it follows the laziest of screenwriting logic: Things happen because that's what the script says. If anyone at any point behaved like a normal, rational person, the movie would end in fifteen minutes.
It is entirely possible to make films about shitty people who you aren't meant to enjoy. The Coen's, David Lynch, and Tony Scott have a host of losers of all types to their name, most of whom you wouldn't ever want to meet. Yet they're fascinating because the films they occupy have a point of view. We know how the filmmaker feels about them.
Marty Supreme has none of that, and I don't think director/writer/editor Josh Safdie knows what he wants to say with his bloated genre mashup. This is a film set in the 1950s with a synth soundtrack and needle drops to 80s Europop. It sets up Marty's struggle against the most ridiculous sport available, yet treats it with reverence throughout. Even Marty; a whiny, unkempt, and repellent child is treated like the most attractive person in existence.
Well before the end, Safdie frames Marty's every action as not just understandable, but entirely justified on his path to maturity. Yet by that point Marty has brutally assaulted multiple people, robbed a store, and served as an accessory to murder. None of that matters. After all, he will one day become a father.
This empathy does not extend to the women of the film. Instead, Safdie treats them with scorn and ridicule at every turn. Marty's mother, Rebecca (an underused Fran Drescher), is described as a crazed shrew who Marty casts aside despite still living at home. His friend-turned-lover, Rachel (Odessa A'zion), is literally framed as a vessel for Marty's seed, only to spend the rest of the film as a punching bag for both Marty and her husband, Ira (Emory Cohen).
At no point do we get the impression that one day Marty's actions will catch up with him. Instead, Safdie's painfully sophomoric script consistently paints him as the hero who understands the hustle of American exceptionalism.
As with other areas, the casting in Marty Supreme is so gimmicky it quickly becomes tiresome. Every part, no matter how minor, has a distractingly notable actor, billionaire, or in-joke to the art house film community. Abel Ferrara plays a mobster, Kevin O'Leary effectively cameos as himself, Géza Röhrig plays a table tennis champion who recounts a baffling holocaust story simply because of Röhrig's role in 2015's Son of Saul. Essayist Pico Iyer appears as the head of the table tennis assocation, there's a David Mamet jumpscare, and Penn Jilette is almost unrecognizable in a bit part.
There are more, but you get the idea. It's an exhausting bit of repetition that makes the film appear bloated simply because Safdie wanted to include everyone in his immediate circle into the picture.
Looking back at my notes, I found a the words "I don't care" written over and over. That's what separates Marty Supreme from other films of its type. I don't like Jerry Lundegaard (William H. Macy) in Fargo, but I care about his situation. I hate Adam Sandler's degenerate gambler Howard in Uncut Gems, but I couldn't stop watching his spiral towards the inevitable.
Marty Supreme is louder than either of those movies, but it somehow says less in the process. Chalamet won't stop talking, and I'm sure some will mistake it the incessant yammering for a great performance. But there's nothing to chew on here, no lines that stick with the viewer once the film ends. It's like being stuck in an elevator with a loudmouth braggart who believes shouting others into silence is the same as winning an argument.
Compare that to the subdued and meticulously structured The Smashing Machine, directed by Josh's brother, Benny, and the difference is like night and day. That film is also about a loser with big dreams constantly slipping from their grasp, but it's packed with pathos and humanity in ways that Marty Supreme can't even begin to comprehend. As far as sports movies about unlikable protagonists go, it's easy to pick the better one.
Joonatan Itkonen
