Marty Supreme: An exhilarating ride

Marty Supreme (2025) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated R, for relentless profanity, sexual content, violence and brief nudity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.11.26

Timothée Chalamet isn’t merely an impressively nuanced actor; he’s also an astonishing chameleon.

 

Marty (Timothée Chalamet, far right) and longtime friend and fellow hustler Wally
(Tyler Okonma, far left) size up the potential victims in a neighborhood bowling
alley with table tennis options.

He all but vanishes into the persona of this madcap film’s title character, a larger-than-life figure whose aggressive personality fills every moment of this 149-minute drama. Director Josh Safdie’s flamboyant style echoes 2024’s similarly dog-nuts Anora, blending breathtaking sports action with freakishly burlesque sidebar sequences.

Events begin in 1952, in Lower East Side New York, where 23-year-old Marty Mauser (Chalamet) works as a clerk in a shoe store owned by his Uncle Murray (music journalist Larry “Ratso” Sloman). Marty excels at his work — as he tastelessly boasts, he could “sell shoes to amputees” — but it’s a job he didn’t choose, and a drudge-laden life that feels stifling and pre-ordained.

 

We’ve scarcely taken in his character, when he has a back-room quickie with a “customer” — Rachel (Odessa A’zion) — who turns out to be a longtime friend and neighbor. The title credits then unspool as his sperm swim up her reproductive tract, and implant themselves into an egg.

 

(Hey, I said Safdie’s approach was outrageous.)

 

Table tennis has become Marty’s escape from a work-a-day world that expects him to stay in his lane. He excels at his sport; he’s ruthless, powerful and blessed with a hustler’s ability to gauge an opponent’s strengths and weaknesses. He speaks constantly of attending and conquering the upcoming world championships in Wembley … but lacks the funds to get there.

 

Trouble is, table tennis isn’t taken seriously in the States in the 1950s. That opinion certainly isn’t shared by those who play each other for cash in a nearby table tennis parlor, where Marty and longtime friend and fellow hustler Wally (Tyler Okonma) frequently fleece unsuspecting marks.

 

Marty is a force of nature. He doesn’t walk; he struts. He doesn’t chat; he dominates every conversation. Statements, proclamations and determined assertions spew from his mouth in a torrent. He believes not only that he’s the best at this sport, but that the world owes him a similar faith in this claim.

 

Less charitably, Marty is arrogant, boorish, rude and quick to take advantage of anybody — or anything — to get what he wants.

 

Not a nice or likable guy. 

 

Do we admire him? Good question.

 

Sitting in Bars with Cake: Scrumptious!

Sitting in Bars with Cake (2023) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for profanity, drug use and sexual candor

Available via: Amazon Prime

By Derrick Bang 

You wouldn’t know it from the title, or the needlessly chaotic initial 10-15 minutes, but once director Trish Sie’s modest little film settles down, it becomes one of the warmest, most touching odes to friendship I’ve seen in years.

 

Jane (Yara Shahidi, center) and her posse — from left, Alex (Charlie Morgan Patton),
Nora (Simone Recasner), Corinne (Odessa A'zion) and Liz (Maia Mitchell) — discover
that "cakebarring" is a great way to attract guys. (Note the cake at table center.)

Credit scripter Audrey Shulman, who clearly wrote from the heart; credit also the persuasively authentic performances by stars Yara Shahidi and Odessa A’zion.

This film’s back-story is equally enchanting. Shulman, a Nashville transplant who wound up in Los Angeles as a twentysomething, was celebrating best friend Chrissy Osmulski’s birthday in a bar in the summer of 2012. Shulman, an avid baker, brought along a cherry cake to share with Chrissy and several other friends; the tasty dessert drew the attention of other patrons, and Shulman suddenly realized that this could be a great way to meet guys.

 

Hence the beginning of what she dubbed “cakebarring.” Starting the following January, she vowed to bake a different cake each week, bringing it and her friends to a different venue each week, with the ultimate goal of 50 cakes by the end of the year. She recorded this tasty campaign in what became a popular blog — complete with recipes — which in turn led to an equally well received 2015 book.

 

Now, working alongside Sie, Shulman has adapted her adventures into a charming film. Shahidi’s Jane is Shulman’s alter ego, while A’zion’s Corinne stands in for Chrissy. They’re best friends totally into each other’s groove, despite being polar opposites. 

 

The bookish Jane, whip-smart but introverted, pursues law school studies apparently dictated by her imperious parents; baking becomes a respite during study breaks. By day, she works as an obsessively organized mailroom clerk in an office run by the somewhat grandmotherly Benita (Bette Midler, in a fleeting part that should have been expanded).

 

The wildly extroverted Corinne, in contrast, is a force of nature: an irrepressible free spirit who embraces any occasion at 15 on a 10-point scale, while bouncing from one joyous experience to the next. (“A human sparkler, a flash of color and light,” as Shulman described Chrissy.)

 

We can’t imagine Corinne keeping a job for more than two weeks. She likely regards sleep as a waste of time, and bemoans the fact that her shy roomie doesn’t work harder at “putting herself out there,” particularly when it comes to what she wears.

 

“If it works for Mr. Rogers,” Jane says defensively, at one point, “it works for me.”

 

Corinne groans … and A’zion is just as marvelous at exasperation, as every other emotion.

 

Let it also be said that costume designer Ciara Whaley obviously had a great time with Corinne’s wild outfits.