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R
for language throughout, sexual content, some violent content/bloody images and nudity.
Starring
Timothee Chalamet, Gwyneth Paltrow, Odessa A’zion, Kevin O’Leary, Tyler Okonma
Director
Josh Safdie
Producer
Ronald Bronstein, Eli Bush, Ti
Genres
Drama
Biopic
Released by
A24 Films on
12/25/2025
Nationwide
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Trailer
Review
There's a kind of exhaustion that sets in while watching Marty Supreme - a response to the relentless, anxiety-inducing noise that defines the 150-minute experience. In Josh Safdie's first solo directorial effort in more than 15 years (following an amicable dissolution of the partnership with his brother, Benny), that anxiety is transplanted from the diamond districts of the 2010s (the setting of Uncut Gems) to the table tennis halls of the 1950s. The result is visually electric, impeccably acted, and ruthlessly paced. The narrative is somewhat threadbare, but it gets the job done.
At the center of this hurricane is Marty Mauser (Timothee Chalamet), a character loosely inspired by real-life ping-pong hustler Marty Reisman. Safdie has taken the raw material of Reisman's eccentricities and crafted a fictional monster. Marty is the most obnoxious, odious fast-talker to grace the screen in recent memory. He is comprised entirely of unshakeable confidence and frantic desperation. Chalamet, pivoting away from Bob Dylan and Paul Atreides, is riveting. He plays Marty not as a charming rogue, but as a true believer in his own superiority (both at the ping pong tables and away from them). It's a train wreck of a personality, and Chalamet commits to the unlikability of the character. It's as probable viewers will be rooting against Marty as for him.
The film surrounding this performance struggles to find its footing. Two and a half hours feels too long for Marty's tale, which turns into a repetitive downward spiral characterized more by Safdie's jittery energy than a compelling storyline. Comparing this to Benny's recent The Smashing Machine, one gets a sense of what Josh brought to the previous partnership, as here he seems to have doubled down on the chaotic impulses that defined the duo's efforts. Marty Supreme masquerades as a sports movie, but anyone anticipating triumphant arcs will find that such expectations have been subverted.
The narrative arc, which stretches from the grimy streets of the Lower East Side to a high-stakes third act in Tokyo, is as much about scamming as playing. Marty isn't just training for the championship; he's swindling his way there. Yet every get-rich-quick scheme has a way of blowing up in his face, and sometimes things get very ugly and very dangerous. (Filmmaker Abel Ferrara has a small role as a terrifying small-time gangster whom Marty crosses.)
A counterweight to Marty's overbearing presence is Rachel Mizler, his pregnant, married girlfriend. In this role, actress Odessa A'zion provides the film with its emotional heartbeat. Gwyneth Paltrow (as faded starlet Kay Stone) may be the film's most notable female performer, but A'zion cedes no ground to her. Rachel is critical to humanizing Marty; without her resilience, Marty's cartoonishness would be complete. We also get one of the year's stranger casting choices in Kevin O'Leary ("Mr. Wonderful" from Shark Tank), who appears as Milton Rockwell, Kay's husband. It feels like stunt casting, yet O'Leary slides into Safdie's world of transactional sharks with ease, playing a calculating businessman.
Safdie's musical choices are nothing if not audacious. In a move that shouldn't work, he mixes period-accurate numbers with an anachronistic '80s sound. It may sound jarring in concept, but in practice, it works. Songs like Alphaville's "Forever Young" and Peter Gabriel's "I Have the Touch" bridge the gap between the mid-century setting and the "me-first" decade from which they originate, framing Marty as a man of the '50s with the soul of a Gordon Gekko disciple.
The ending is note-perfect: a moment of redemption and recognition that threatens to bring a tear to the eye. When the needle drops on "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" by Tears for Fears at the fade-to-black (the best use of the song in a movie since the opening of the otherwise forgettable Peter's Friends), it elevates the entire experience. If I was on the fence at times during the previous 145 minutes, Safdie got me in the end.
Marty Supreme is a flawed beast - occasionally irritating, sometimes shallow, and undeniably exhausting. But that exhaustion is the point. Safdie drags the audience through the wringer not to punish us, but to make the final release that much sweeter. Driven by Chalamet's fearless performance and a directorial style that refuses to blink, the film leaves an impression. It can be a challenging watch, but in the landscape of late-2025 cinema, it is electrifyingly alive.
© 2025 James Berardinelli
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