Marty Supreme

Marty Supreme is a movie I liked less, the more I thought about it.

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Scott's Self-Indulgent Movie Podcast · Episode 1090: Marty Supreme

I didn't intend to start this review with a rant. I was mostly going to use this review to talk about the difference between the Safdie's as filmmakers, and highlighting what made this movie work a bit better for me than some of the other Safdie films. And then Timothée Chalamet had to open his mouth. 

The short version is, in his Oscar press tour Chalamet referred to opera and ballet as "dead" art forms, saying he wants to prevent film from becoming "one of those," which drew the ire of a lot of folks who value said forms or are currently performing in them.

My quick take is that is while I get what he's saying, opera and ballet are not the cultural forces they may have been in generations past, most artists generally agree that you don't shit on other art forms or artists so this is bad form by someone who should know better.

But that's not what drew my ire.

What really drew my ire was when Michael B. Jordan won Best Actor at the Oscars for Sinners...and folks online began to say Chalamet lost because of his comments. 

And there's a lot of reasons this is stupid and racist, but I'll focus on the biggest one.

Implying that a black man who convincingly performed in two roles in a critically acclaimed movie that more or less hinges on said performances won because a white actor made a misstep in his press tour is racist and fucked up. You're implying he didn't win on his own merits and that Chalamet was actually more deserving. Aka the only way Jordan could win was not through the strength of his performance but through a white actor screwing up. 

Which is nonsense because I'd give that Oscar to Jordan in a heartbeat every time.

Also Ryan Coogler showed enough respect to old "dead" art forms to bring Misty Copeland out of ballet retirement and a number of grueling surgery recoveries to perform "I Lied To You" at the Oscar ceremony, because someone's film understood that artists are always building on the artists before them.

Anyhoo let's talk about this movie, that I initially liked when I when I watched, and have started to turn on for reasons I'll get into.

The Setup

Timothée Chalamet plays Marty Mauser, a shoe-salesman who dreams of becoming the ping-pong world champion. But as charming as Marty can be, and as good as he is, it appears that Marty's unquenchable drive and ego could hinder his chances at greatness.

It's been a tough stretch if you're a brotherly filmmaking duo. First the Coens decide to split after decades of critically acclaimed and Oscar-winning films and now the Safdie's go their separate ways after some genuinely disturbing details about one of the cast members of Good Tine comes to light. What I don't think anybody expected was for both brothers, Benny and Josh, to release such disparate movies both vying for awards in the same year with Benny working with Dwayne Johnson to make The Smashing Machine and Josh delivering A24's biggest box office hit to date, Marty Supreme. And what really stood out to me? Honestly which filmmaker's instincts I, and from the looks of it critics and audiences, prefer the most...and all of the reasons that kinda sucks. So today, I'm going to dig into what makes Marty Supreme so much more engaging than The Smashing Machine before I delve into why my preference for Josh as a filmmaker is kinda a bummer.

Before I get into the differences between Benny and Josh's films, I wanted to go over a quick refresh of what folks came to expect from the Safdie's movies. In the last decade, the Safdie's came to prominence, at least amongst film geeks, for their frenetic crime movies. Usually featuring a lead performer going through a series of extreme and stressful situations to solve a money related problem through a series of unsavory means. This often featured guerilla filmmaking tactics like hiring non-actors to play parts or filming on location in crowded cities.

After their breakout in this vein with Heaven Knows What they also became known for giving somewhat maligned performers people viewed as limited a chance to show off their range with gritty/grunge-y performances including a post-Twilight tone shift for Robert Pattinson with Good Time and what should've been an Academy Award nominated performance for Adam Sandler in Uncut Gems.

Visually their movies are known for what I've dubbed the "indie film grain look" with high contrast visuals, shaky cameras meant to capture the emotional tenor of these individual scenes and conflicts, and a lot of movement back and forth (even within individual exchanges).

So having already seen The Smashing Machine, I was curious about which brother was responsible for what elements. And it seems pretty clear cut at first blush.

Benny vs. Josh: Subtle Similarities, Big Differences

The vibes between these two movies are about as different as you can imagine. The Smashing Machine is quiet and pensive and generally lacks the chaotic energy you might expect from the material and from one half of the Safdie team.

Whereas Marty Supreme feels...exactly like Uncut Gems and Good Time. Our lead performer is a whirlwind wheeling and dealing between exciting and dangerous scenarios on a dime with a laser focus on his ultimate goal. We also feature elements that become more pronounced when they're not there in The Smashing Machine like the chaotic overlapping dialogue that occurs disagreements and the frenetic camera movement that occurs within scenes, either following the action of emotional energy of the scene (i.e. flipping wildly back and forth depending on who's delivering the latest batch of yelling).

But the biggest surprise? The cinematography. Because Marty Supreme is cleanest any Safdie movie has looked. Despite being a period piece occurring in the 1950s, all of the visuals for Marty feel modern, crisp and dynamic. The high contrast between the tables and players vs. the onlookers and the rest of the room in the tournament segment is a perfect example.

Each match is incredibly easy to follow in terms of who's doing well and by how much regardless of how much the camera does or doesn't move. 

Whereas, The Smashing Machine maintains what I thought was the Safdie crime movie film grain look and features a lot more static shots that I would expect.

The similarities are there, but they're very subtle. Camera positioning in both movies is almost always an actor level to give the audience the feeling like they're going through the same things the characters are or are more of a participant/onlooker versus someone being told a story. Likewise, both directors seem highly capable of getting powerful moments and performances from their actors that matches the energy of the film in question.

And if I'm being honest, I much prefer Josh's approach. And now we can get into why.

How To Use A Whirlwind Central Performance

Josh and Ben both seem very good and capable of getting great performances out of their actors, often getting them to embrace less glamorous sides of the image they've so carefully worked to cultivate. So if you're Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, you get him to be vulnerable and if you're Timothée Chalamet you have him embrace...every negative aspect his deepest critics think about it. A "not-as-talented as he thinks is he is," fuck boy who seems to get off on his own image of himself and he does from sheer adrenaline.

Both are good performances. But one is captured infinitely better. The problem with Ben's approach is that there's a lot of contrast lacking. While I'm sure certain aspects are consistent with someone who likely has CTE and painkiller addiction, Mark Coleman's lows in The Smashing Machine occur almost entirely off-screen including his overdose.

While every shitty thing and ego-bomb Marty gets is right there on screen providing an immediate contrast to the fast-talking, self-centered and self-aggrandizing whirlwind. You watch and feel his ego die when he's bested in a tournament early.

You need to frame the movie around the performance, not just rely on the emotions of the actors to sell each moment or its importance and Marty Supreme does a much better job of that.

Capturing Chaos

The other aspect, that makes Josh's film more appealing is a carry-over from his collaborations with his brother: chaos. As a director Josh Safdie wants chaotic moments in his character's lives to look and feel as chaotic as they are to live through. 

Some of this is camera work, which I alluded to before. Since we'll switch back and forth to either side of an argument, almost always in a confined space, or with a tight close up to emphasize a character's reaction. 

Which provides a nice contrast when Marty moves from more working-class cramped environments into "classier" establishments with space...and Marty seems unable to pivot into this world.

Another part of this is editing. While the story is more or less a straight line with a couple of time jumps, the editing of these scenes are either reinforcing how the chaos feels to characters (aka violence is always a quick terrifying arrival), or hinting at the "truth of these scenes." See how Marty is talking shit and messing around with friend and fellow competitor while a new player from Japan is respectfully decimating his opponents in what may as well be non-contests.

And now we have to get into two reasons why me liking this approach better is a bummer.

Reason #1: The Reason the Safdie Brothers Aren't Working Together Anymore

I'll make it clear that the Safdie's public reason for splitting was the bog standard "creative differences" which I'm sure there's some truth too. If you're Ben and you don't want to spend your time making a bunch of movies about criminals, after Uncut Gems is the time to do it. 

But based on a report from the actress Good Time, a giant reason came from one of their earliest productions. This here's a summary of the events taken from World of Reel:

During the shoot in New York, with Josh monitoring on a screen and Benny handling sound, sources allege Buddy exposed himself and crudely propositioned a minor while cameras continued rolling. Multiple on-set sources say Josh, the lead director, learned of the actress’s age only after the scene, as she became traumatized—an incident critics argue violated SAG rules and industry standards protecting minors.

The Safdies cut the disputed scene from “Good Time” before its 2017 Cannes premiere, citing “creative reasons,” but the issue resurfaced in 2022 when Benny learned the “Good Time” actress was a minor, creating a rift between the brothers. Josh blamed former producing partner Bear-McClard for hiring her, while Bear-McClard disputed responsibility and noted he was not present during the incident. The Safdies later cut ties with him and moved to dissolve their shared production company.

Despite rising tensions, the Safdies continued working together for another nine months and were in early 2023 pre-production on that Sandler-Affleck movie. However, their partnership reportedly ended in March 2023, after a Variety report on Bear-McClard’s divorce filing surfaced and details of the “Good Time” incident were revealed.

If this account is fully accurate, it sounds like Ben was justifiably furious at both the producer for hiring this girl who was traumatized and his brother for keeping certain details under wraps. It's a moral stand I can get behind. And based on his casting for Marty Supreme and general attitude toward filming, I'm unsure what lessons Josh has learned. The actors he's worked with in recent memory haven't taken him to task, but that's something that shouldn't have been an issue in the first place and definitely shades my opinion of Josh as a person and considering the subject matter he so frequently chooses, as a filmmaker.

It also makes aspects within Marty Supreme like our love interest Rachel feigning being hit by her not-so-great husband feel a bit grosser. Like what are you trying to say about this man? Marty defending her by beating up the guy who beat her is one of the best impulses he has the entire film.

Reason #2: What's The Takeaway? *Ending Spoilers Ahead*

It's been interesting to see what people like about Marty Supreme. Or rather, what they take away from it. Broadly speaking, people like that chaotic energy and seem to enjoy Marty as a stand-in for things like "The American Dream" on steroids. A man willing to threaten, steal and cheat, who justifiably encounters consequences for all of those actions, and gets primed for an ultimate humiliation. A character study in someone who's bought into their own hype too much.

In the end, the same ego that wouldn't let him be quiet and focus on being the allegedly best ping-pong player in the world, is the same ego that "saves" him in the end, prevents the humiliation and sends him back home to see his child in the hospital, whom he weeps at the sight at through a glass window. Like he's somehow balanced that ego. Seemingly finding the balance between his ego, his dignity and his abilities.

It's an ending the Safdie Brothers wouldn't write.

It is very interesting to me that when they've branched off, both Safdie brothers have embraced a more sentimental approach. So instead of addiction defining Mark Colman, he finds strength in himself and his chaotic but loving partner. And Marty learns just enough humility to apologize, challenge a man who humiliated him before and decides to be at home with a woman and child he's mostly treated like an obligation vs. a carting partnership.

Whereas each of the Safdie's previous films end with bittersweet notes, with our characters either facing responsibility for their irresponsible behavior or carrying trauma with them.

Maybe that's what that crying scene at the end of Marty Supreme is meant to convey. A final opening of the flood gates as Marty finally realizes and internalizes that there are other people in this world besides himself and he should behave accordingly and use what gifts he has to ensure this child has a future.

But the truth is...Marty doesn't deserve redemption. While his desire to ascend can be seen as admirable, he's treated everyone in his path like an obstacle, whether or not that's accurate or fair. But instead of having his ego finally being killed off, literally or figuratively, he gets to succeed and embrace something new. 

Conscious or not, it almost feels like Josh Safdie is writing his own story. Where his past misdeeds when he was a younger, hungier up and comer and worse person matter so much less than how he behaves now. With dignity and respect and a couple of apologies.

As much as it wouldn't mirror real-life Mark Colman is the one who deserves Marty's ending. A chance to reclaim his dignity after putting in the work to be a better person. Because Marty hasn't.