Since rising to fame in the 2010s, Timothée Chalamet has had an interesting career over the past ten years. After winning over audiences and critics in Call Me By Your Name, the thirty-year old actor has gone from arthouse films to romantic comedy-drama (The French Dispatch), political satire (Don’t Look Up), musical comedy (Wonka), and science-fiction (Dune Part 1 and 2). Last year, he scored his second Best Actor nomination by portraying Bob Dylan in the biographical drama A Complete Unknown. Now, Chalamet is back with his latest film- Marty Supreme. Directed by Josh Safdie (Uncut Gems) and co-written by Safdie and Ronald Bronstein, the sports adventure dramedy movie is based on the true story of table tennis player Marty Reisman. It also stars Gwyneth Paltrow, Kevin O’Leary, Odessa A’zion, Tyler Okonma, Abel Ferrara, and Fran Drescher.

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Marty Mauser is a young man working for his uncle Murray (Larry Sloman) as a shoe salesman in 1952 New York and having a romantic relationship with Rachel (A’zion), whom he’s known since childhood. He’s also an avid table tennis participant and at the top of his game. The sport of table tennis is still a niche in America, but Marty wants to make it popular there. His goal is to make it to the World Championships and become a winner. Upon becoming world champion, his plan will be to sell novelty tennis balls with his name trademarked on them, as well as appearing on Wheaties cereal boxes. Although talented and energetic, Marty is brash, proud, hot-tempered, arrogant, and doesn’t make good decisions. The choices he tends to pursue often focus on the short-term without considering the long-term implications. Also, he tends to focus on his goals with a reckless disregard of the consequences for other people. When Murray does not pay his nephew the wages needed for the England trip, Marty resorts to stealing the money from his uncle.

After travelling to London, Marty competes in the British Open while running up a fraudulent expense claim at the Ritz Hotel. Despite making a solid impression by defeating the defending champion Béla Kletzki (Géza Röhrig), he loses a match against Japanese contestant Koto Endo (Koto Kawaguchi), who happens to be deaf but is a formidable table tennis player. The resulting tantrum Marty throws leads to him becoming a laughingstock in the Japanese press and Endo becoming a national hero. During this time, Marty becomes acquainted with stage actress Kay Stone (Paltrow), who is the wife of wealthy businessman Milton Rockwell (O’Leary), who’s made his money in manufacturing and selling ink pens. The two commence a love affair.

In the aftermath of the British Open, Marty goes on the touring circuit with the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team by playing table tennis with Kletzi at the halftime intermission. He soon becomes disillusioned with being a novelty act and longs to elevate his career. Rockwell approaches him with an offer of playing an exhibition match with Endo in Tokyo, Japan before the World Championships. Initially tempted, Marty refuses to do so after learning Rockwell wants him to throw the match as a way of appeasing the Japanese market. Upon returning home, he ends up being charged with stealing from his uncle’s safe. Marty reconnects with Rachel and discovers she is pregnant with his child, as well as learning that her husband Ira (Emory Cohen) is abusing her. Further complicating things, he is expected to pay a fine to the International Table Tennis Association or be banned from competing in the World Championships.

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A freak accident causes Marty to cross paths with gangster Ezra Mishkin (Ferrara), who hires him to deliver his dog to a local veterinarian. With the help of his friend Wally (Okonma), he attempts to do the errand, but gets distracted after stopping to hustle a bunch of New Jersey tough guys in a bowling alley. Marty and Wally are attacked by the crowd and narrowly escape with their lives, losing Ezra’s dog in the process. Kay and Rockwell return to New York for the former’s new stage play. Marty approaches Rockwell to take him up on the exhibition match offer but is coldly turned down. Following another tryst with Kay, Marty steals one of her necklaces in an effort to make some money, but he discovers that it is worthless costume jewelry. Now visibly pregnant, Rachel tells him that her husband Ira is beating her, which leads to a no-holds barred assault on the latter. Marty and Rachel attempt to recover Ezra’s dog in hopes of getting a financial reward, but the farmer who found the animal shoots at them. Rachel admits that she faked an injury and being beaten badly as a way to manipulate the situation, and Marty decides to cut all ties with her.

Desperate to raise money to pay the fine, Marty decides to seek financial assistance from Kay. When that ultimately proves to be futile, he attempts to try his luck again with Rockwell, who is willing to take him on in exchange for submitting to a degrading act. But is it too late to do anything about the World Championships? And, even if he succeeds, can Marty fix things with his family and friends? Furthermore, Rachel’s pregnancy hangs in the balance, and Marty has to decide whether or not to pursue the path he’s leading or to change his ways.

Timothée Chalamet shines as Marty Mauser. He is skinny as a whippet, wiry and fast-paced in his movements. Chalamet is also onscreen in nearly every scene, so it virtually revolves around him. Reportedly, the actor spent six years training in table tennis to prepare for this film. His lean, lithe frame also shows a weathered, worn down presence. The table tennis sequences show a man who’s alert, hyper-focused, and at the top of his game.

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The rest of the cast does well with the material they’re given. Gwyneth Paltrow proves herself to be at the top of her game as Kay. Having taken a hiatus from Hollywood, it is quite engaging to see Paltrow acting onscreen once again. As Kay, she makes the character relatable in fearing that her best years are in the rearview mirror, and a near-breakdown over bad reviews showcases her inner vulnerability. Kevin O’Leary, best known from his judging role on the Shark Tank reality series, shines as Milton Rockwell, and he elevates the role from being just a generic rich man. Initially pleasant and smugly self-serving, O’Leary makes Rockwell a more menacing presence in the third act when he forces Marty to submit to his will. This is best exemplified by a degrading punishment that he dishes out on the insolent younger man. What follows is an unsettling brutal sequence that is both horrific and amusing (depending on how one reads the situation). Odessa A’zion makes Rachel sympathetic and likeable, but that is only to a point. Her turning point comes when she tells a lie in order to manipulate Marty into doing her bidding. It gives a troubling impression, especially when considering the fact that she uses a falsehood as a means of getting what she wants.

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Géza Röhrig succeeds in depicting Béla Kletzki as a likeable, professional athlete. His big shining moment comes when relating to Marty a story of how he survived a stint in Auschwitz during World War II. While it seems rather over-the-top and even far-fetched, the scene helps make Kletzki a foil and reverse counterpart of Marty. Abel Ferrara makes Ezra aggressive and increasingly dangerous as the plot progresses. The scene of him brutalizing a man who tries to fool him is chilling to watch, as is his coercion and roping in Marty to do his biding. Finally, Tyler Okonma brings a solid, likeable demeanour as Wally. Despite only appearing in the second and third acts, he manages to make the character sympathetic as he’s dragged by Marty from one bad decision to another. In some ways, Okonma is the film’s closest thing to a straight man as he tries (and fails) to talk sense into Marty. Koto Kawaguchi delivers a solid, lasting impression as Endo. Although he’s a supporting player and seen though Marty’s eyes, he is stoic, calm, and focused on playing the game. What’s intriguing about Kawaguchi is that he isn’t a professional actor; rather, he is a professional ping pong player who has competed in and won several deaf table tennis championships. Unlike the volatile brashness of Chalamet’s Marty, he is professional, polite, and keenly devoted to his sport. It is suggested that his deafness has strengthened to the point of his being focused on the rhythm of table tennis. The film succeeds in making Kawaguchi’s character a force to be reckoned with — all the while not playing into the sappy cliché “inspirationally disabled” stereotype of past sports dramas.

As a filmmaker, director Josh Sadie keeps the film’s action squarely focused on the characters and their predicament. His speciality is using close-ups and rapid-fire editing. The movie comes off as feeling fresh, kinetic, and unpredictable. It almost brings to mind Sadie’s past film Uncut Gems, which also features Adam Sandler’s hapless protagonist with poor judgement making increasingly bad decisions as the story progresses.

With regard to production values, the film is quite impressive to look at. Cinematographer Darius Khondji gives a gritty, grounded cinéma vérité look of 1950s New York and London, and he accomplishes this by shooting the film on 35mm film and vintage Panavision C and B Series anamorphic lenses with minimal use of digital shots. The end result looks both realistic and non-glamourized. Production designer Jack Fisk makes the film’s setting look like a real, lived-in environment in which the characters are experiencing the grit and hardships of their world. In addition to writing the script, Safdie and Bronstein also serve as editors on the film. Both men keep the flow of the story at a swift pace, and it does not feel long at two hours and twenty-eight minutes. Daniel Lopatin’s musical score is electronically-composed, and fast-paced. Although the film is set in the 1950s, Lopatin’s score has synth pop and New Wave influences from the 1980s, which gives off a jarring effect. The film also features songs by New Order, Peter Gabriel, Constance Demby, and Tears for Fears.

Overall, Marty Supreme is an excellent film. Chalamet, Paltrow, O’Leary, A’zion, and Ferrara all turn in excellent performances. Safdie continues to prove himself as a formidable director. This is one of the year’s best movies. Five out of five stars.