Last month, Josh Safdie’s “Marty Supreme” was the “surprise screening” at the New York Film Festival. The 2.5-hour cut shown at Alice Tully Hall earned glowing reactions on social media, but there’s a review embargo firmly installed until December 1st.
A full trailer has now been released for “Marty Supreme.” It looks great. The hype will only grow for this one. Josh might have delivered the kind of Oscar contender his brother, Benny, couldn’t with “The Smashing Machine.”
The cinematography comes from the great Darius Khondji, ensuring that these will be the best-looking ping pong matches we’ve ever seen on screen.
Set in 1953, “Marty Supreme” tells the story of a Ping Pong champion. It is said to be a “fictional work,” though the life of Marty Reisman served as a template. Khondji stated that the film, written by Safdie and Ronald Bronstein, has around 240 speaking roles, which I still find hard to believe. Can anyone who was in attendance confirm this?
This is A24’s most expensive film ever, rumored to have cost around $90M, and with a Christmas release set, it’s clear that hopes are high. The cast is also delightfully eccentric, joining Timothee Chalamet: Gwyneth Paltrow, Fran Drescher, Tyler, The Creator, Abel Ferrara, Penn Jillette, Kevin O’Leary (!!!), and Sandra Bernhard.
A handful of reactions are calling Chalamet’s performance ‘career-best’ work. I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s the case, and he joins Leonardo DiCaprio at the top of the best actor race — the Oscar could very well come down to those two. Of note, Chalamet, 29, is the youngest two-time Best Actor nominee since James Dean. He’s going to make it three nominations come next January.
The “Marty Supreme” Oscar campaign is already off to a wonderful start. Timothée Chalamet, the film’s lead and current frontrunner, posted a bizarre video of pumpkin-headed figures playing ping-pong to the tune of “I am the clit commander.” Gwyneth Paltrow has been oversharing about her “palatable” sex scenes and “tongue choreography” with Chalamet — while admitting she had no idea who he was before filming. Meanwhile, co-star Kevin O’Leary is blasting the production for “wasting millions” on human extras instead of using AI stand-ins.
“Marty Supreme” opens nationwide on December 25, 2025