‘Marty Supreme’ is a Pingpong Ballbuster

While pingpong is its central sport, ambition is the name of the game in “Marty Supreme.”

Released in theaters Dec. 25, the latest blood-pressure-raising feature from writer-director Josh Safdie stars Timothée Chalamet as an egotistical table tennis player whose ruthless drive is fueled by dreams of pingpong glory — and perhaps a little self-delusion, though the thought would never cross his one-track mind. 

Scrawny, scrappy and skint, Marty Mauser isn’t your typical professional athlete. Then again, “Marty Supreme” isn’t your typical sports drama. Shrinking the sweaty tennis athletics of last year’s leading sports flick “Challengers” onto a decidedly smaller table, the protagonist of this frantic comedy-drama unleashes a disproportionate amount of chaos onto 1950s New York City.

Introduced as a charismatic shoe salesman on the Lower East Side, Mauser quickly reveals himself as a master manipulator willing to deceive, threaten or swindle any man, woman or child for a shot at front-of-the-Wheaties-box fame. 

If you give a Mauser a cookie — cash for a flight to the table tennis British Open in London — he’ll ask to stay in your spare room or for a fat check to fund his bright orange pingpong ball innovation. Caught in the clever businessman’s complicated web, who are the resigned Manhattanites to say no to such self-assurance?

Mauser’s outlandish egomania and audacious exploitation tactics make him both entirely repugnant and impossible not to root for, if even through gritted teeth.

Capitalizing off the boyish charm and megawatt starpower tied to his image as young Hollywood’s most promising player, Chalamet (“Dune,” “Call Me by Your Name”) forces audience investment in an easily detestable character with a performance that imbues a larger-than-life personality with raw humanity. 

At 29-years-old, Chalamet is already a two-time Oscar nominee at the helm of a massive sci-fi film franchise. He’s received critical acclaim for his portrayal of numerous iconic figures like Willy Wonka and Bob Dylan and worked with a laundry list of auteur filmmakers. His shining career already outlined as a constellation in the fabric of cinematic history, the actor didn’t need to push much further to prove his talent in “Marty Supreme.” 

Yet, with a hungry, career-defining performance, he does. 

Also a producer on the independent A24 film, Chalamet’s embarked on an unorthodox press run showing he’s aimed at higher aspirations — quite literally, as he scaled both the Las Vegas Sphere and Empire State Building to promote the movie.

From posting satirical pitch meetings with the film’s marketing team to featuring on a song with his rumored alter-ego, breakout British rapper EsDeeKid, Chalamet appears to have fully committed himself to the overly self-promoting bit. 

The actor’s ambition, though, doesn’t appear to be quite as much of a front. Earlier this year at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, where Chalamet took home the best actor prize for his turn as Dylan in “A Complete Unknown,” he declared he’s in “pursuit of greatness” and wants to be “one of the greats.”

Recently, in a divisive clip from a now-deleted interview with Margaret Gardiner, Chalamet said his role as Mauser is the culmination of the “top of the line” work he’s produced in the last seven or eight years of his career. Whether his confidence is viewed as cocky or earned, it proves Chalamet an apt fit for his role in “Marty Supreme.”

The film’s supporting cast, littered with industry veterans like Gwyneth Paltrow and Fran Drescher, is equally gripping in their unrestrained performances. The ensemble also boasts the birth of unlikely dramatic stars in Tyler Okonma — better known as rapper Tyler, The Creator — “Shark Tank”’s Kevin O’Leary and HBO’s new comedic darling Odessa A’Zion. 

Each star’s light bounces delightfully off Chalamet’s, sometimes softening the film’s grit into sand and frequently sharpening it into a lethal blade.

In the thrilling fashion of his crime films “Uncut Gems” and “Good Times,” which he co-directed with his brother Benny, Safdie turns the pingpong table from a frat party staple to a stage for violence and glory with textural cinematography, sharp black humor and a brazen plot that explodes rather than unravels.

Giving a game typically played in a garage at a graduation party life-or-death stakes, Safdie pushes watchers to the edge of their theater seats with the unnerving unpredictability of the athlete’s comeuppance. Accompanied by anachronistic ‘80s needle drops, audience jaws are bound to fall open with pearl-clutching sequences that border on confounding. 

This brash filmmaking isn’t modest in the slightest — much like its protagonist and lead actor, “Marty Supreme” knows it’s bound for greatness. And, like these two, if it were any less impressive, it would be hard to tolerate. Luckily, it’s a glorious 149-minute car crash you can’t quite peel your eyes away from. 

Thus, the best way to watch “Marty Supreme” is to go in blind. Let the film’s audacity smack you over the head with a pingpong paddle. 

“Marty Supreme,” rated R, is in theaters now.