Rent Marty Supreme (2025)

Supreme Hustle - Marty Supreme review by griggs

Marty spends the whole film insisting he’s a star; Timothée Chalamet quietly proves he already is. Marty Supreme sits between sports movie, grifter comedy and full-on meltdown, following a ping-pong prodigy who carves his “destiny” out of everyone else’s time and money. Safdie shoots 50s New York like a grimy daydream and then slaps 80s bangers over the top, turning the period into a post-modernist myth rather than straight nostalgia.

When it sticks with Marty scheming and scrambling, this absolutely cooks. The trouble is it keeps wandering off into side quests and replaying the same beats, so you really do feel the extra half-hour hanging off it. The table-tennis itself is weirdly flat – the results feel decided from the first serve. Chalamet still drags it through the bloat with a restless, live-wire turn. Under all the sweat and synths, it’s about how male “purpose” steamrollers everyone around it.

Odessa A’zion gives the story its bruised heart as Rachel, while Gwyneth Paltrow’s fading star Kay makes the satire bite a little harder. One image stuck with me: a box of Marty Supreme balls bursting open and orange spheres spilling across the street, his big dream literally bouncing away from him. The film’s at its best when those scams – orange balls, cheap jewellery, a stolen dog and all – smack into the people who actually pay the price.

That final scene, with Marty finally sounding honest – or putting on the best honesty act you’ve ever seen – leaves a satisfying itch rather than neat closure. I walked out impressed and a bit uneasy. In the year of duelling solo Safdies, Marty Supreme edges out The Smashing Machine – more character, less macho myth; the ping-pong hustler beats the MMA bruiser on sheer nerve.

A Mess - Marty Supreme review by KB

I thought this was a poor film. There isn't much to the story & it's not well told at all .A poor table tennis player who wins an exhibition match at the end with some silly sub plots along the way about a dog he is looking after , some honey bees & some domestic issues & that's about it. It's all very disjointed .irritatingly noisy in places & far fetched & silly. Also ,for a film about a table tennis player you hardly see him playing until the end.

Mediocre, Overlong, Boring Crime Caper Fake Biopic Against a 1952 Table-tennis Backdrop - Marty Supreme review by PV

When making a movie about sport, you have to choose what sort of film you're making, and the genre can be romance (WIMBLEDON, OXFORD BLUES) or thriller (1981's ESCAPE TO VICTORY), fantasy (FIELD OF DREAMS) or, as here, biopic - a fake biopic like ROCKY. This is the latter.

The sport here is table tennis which was MASSIVE in the post-war period in the UK. See the 1999 novel THE MIGHTY WALZER by Howard Jacobson, a semi-autobiographical novel about a teen obsessed with table tennis in 1950s Manchester.

However, it becomes more of a crime caper really, with an increasingly unlikely plot, complete with cartoon characters having capers around the world.

I suspect this sort of movie plays better with American audiences than British ones. They probably warm to the cocky hustler as I never did or could, and like the snappy salesman-type fast-talk. I find it annoying.

You can however smell the money on this - the scenes and 1952 context is all perfectly recreated. It looks authentic and expensive!

I rarely use this word about any film, but this was BORING. Also overlong and bloated. I was watching the clock at the one hour point, then 90 minutes, past 2 hours to 2.20. Why? A basic story could fit in 90 minutes if you sliced off the copious rolls of flab.

Nominated for loads of awards, it won none. Good.

2 stars