Marty Supreme

I absolutely loved "Uncut Gems." I wouldn't say I'm a hardcore Safdie Bros fan. Appreciator is probably a more accurate word. "Uncut Gems" thrust us into the psyche of a hardcore gambling addict who also happened to be a sketchy jeweler. It felt like we were spending time with a real person that maybe we didn't personally know, but it was fascinating to see how far their self-destruction would take them and the story. And it was a thrill in the end to see some their biggest gambles pay-off, if only for a few moments.

"Marty Supreme" conversely is near punishing in its twists and turns. Our protagonist is purely a fast talking egomaniac, not a particularly interesting person, and with how little ping pong is actually played, his prowess on the table candidly makes no sense.

To pair with our prodigious mench of a ping ponger, we spend lots of time with several irredeemably awful supporting characters. The relatively straight sports thriller of a first act devolves into a second and third act that meander through a loud, irritating, and often outright hostile 1950s New York with little to show for our suffering in the end. Why did we follow this person? It's not because this is a true tale, faithful to the film's inspiration, table tennis legend Marty Reisman. This is a very, very loose take on Reisman by all accounts. Josh Safdie is simply basing the main character on his reported vibe, giving our lead the same first name, and setting the story during the same time period Reisman lived.

Some of the situations that take up large stretches of the film and motivate many core character actions in the story make little sense, and the characters' decisions do not feel like those of any real person who exists on planet earth. I do not understand the acclaim for "Marty Supreme" at all.

Overall, a lazily written, but pretty-to-look-at, overlong, waste of time. I am rooting for "Marty" to win nothing. Timothee is young. He will have other bites at the Oscar apple down the road. - 4/10