As I wrote on Monday, Josh Safdie’s “Marty Supreme,” the Timothée Chalamet–starring ping pong movie, recently tested, and word from someone in the room was clear: don’t expect your “typical Safdie” joint. This isn’t “Good Time,” and it’s definitely not “Uncut Gems.” By all accounts, the movie is a totally different beast — far removed from the brothers’ signature anxiety-inducing style.
We now have that confirmed via the film’s first trailer, which does play in “conventional” fashion, and there’s obviously a lot of reluctance, on A24’s part, to spill too much of the plot, which makes sense — the film is only set for release four months from now.
With that said, the trailer is good, sweeping, in fact. I’m told it doesn’t really capture the full tone of the film, which is really ambitious. A bold swing on the part of Safdie. The ping pong scenes look awesome!
Set in 1953, “Marty Supreme” will tell the story of a Ping Pong champion. It is said to be a “fictional work,” but the life of Marty Reisman was used as a template. The screenplay was written by Safdie and Ronald Bronstein. Last year, it had been reported that Safdie’s film cost close to $90M to produce.
The film also has quite the eccentric cast, including Chalamet, Gwyneth Paltrow, Fran Drescher, Tyler The Creator, Abel Ferrara, Penn Jillette, Kevin O’Leary and Sandra Bernhard.
Now, as for that festival premiere I hinted about earlier in the week, I had been told that A24 is tempted to insert the film inside the New York Film Festival lineup as a “surprise screening.” Whether that will actually happen remains to be seen, but it’s very legit intel, and there’s been talks about how exactly to include the film inside the fest’s lineup.
Regardless, it’s pretty wild how Josh and Benny Safdie, masters of gutter poetry, decided to split, and in doing so, are set to release solo, and A24-backed, sports biopics this fall. I hope it works out for them, but as Ethan Coen has taught us, sometimes, that could be a very bad idea.