Back in 2019, brothers Benny and Josh Safdie delivered one of the best films of the year, and possibly the decade, with “Uncut Gems.” The film was, as I wrote in a review earlier this year, “a 135-minute anxiety attack.” And I mean that in the best possible way – I have enormous amounts of respect for movies and filmmakers that know just how to push my buttons. Now in 2025, the Safdie brothers have graduated to solo projects. Benny didn’t fare too well with “The Smashing Machine” (whose review I quoted earlier), though Dwayne Johnson did earn a surprise Golden Globe nomination for playing MMA fighter Mark Kerr, so maybe there’s some life in that film after all. But Josh has found both commercial and critical success with his new film “Marty Supreme,” and he did it by sticking with what works.

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The film follows Marty Mauser (Timothée Chalamet), a con artist in1952 New York who happens to be really good at ping pong. He’s able to come in second at the British Open, and a spot at the World Championships in Japan should be his… if he can raise the $1,500 he needs to pay a fine. Throughout the course of the film, he’ll try to raise the money by hustling games at a nearby bowling alley with help from his friend Wally (Tyler Okonma), robbing his uncle’s shoe store, ransoming a dog (that he doesn’t have) to its gangster owner (Abel Ferrara), getting a sponsorship from a friend’s father, getting a sponsorship from a businessman (Kevin O’Leary) who wants him to throw an exhibition match, pawning a necklace owned by the businessman’s actress wife (Gwyneth Paltrow) with whom he’s having an affair, and assorted other schemes. On top of it all, he learns that he may be the father to the baby of his married girlfriend Rachel (Odessa A’zion), and that may require some flim-flamming as well.

The whole thing is basically “Uncut Gems” again, to the point where I’m convinced that Marty must be related to Adam Sandler’s character from that movie. Rachel’s baby would be too old to be Sandler’s age, but maybe Marty had another baby about a decade down the line. The point is that the two movies feature outstanding leads that are put through the wringer as they try futilely to clean up the messes they’ve created for themselves. Good thing I think this is a winning formula, and enough time has passed since “Uncut Gems” that I’m ready for another, similar round. I would have preferred that maybe a few more loose ends be tied up in the finale, but otherwise this is a top-tier awards contender.

Speaking of awards, the movie and Chalamet’s performance are doing so well in preliminaries that several Oscar nominations seem like a lock. “Uncut Gems” was overlooked back in 2019, probably due to reluctance to nominate any Adam Sandler project (it was Oscar-worthy though, despite 95 percent of Sandler’s filmography). That won’t be a problem this year with darling Chalamet in the lead. Heck, voters probably should have given Chalamet an Oscar last year for playing Bob Dylan in “A Complete Unknown,” not because he was necessarily “better” than Adrian Brody in “The Brutalist,” but because a Chalamet win would have saved the ceremony from Brody’s hostile, overlong, self-indulgent speech.

Another Oscars possibility is that Chalamet and Dwayne Johnson could both be nominated for Best Actor, pitting the Safdie Brothers against each other. Okay, a nomination for Johnson is iffy, and three spots would have to go to other actors, but what a story that would make if it happened. I’m getting all excited thinking about The Rock doing his “just bring it” gesture to Chalamet across a wrestling ring as the Safdies watch on from the corners. But even if we don’t get that family feud, “Marty Supreme” has big things ahead of it in awards season, and rightfully so.

Grade: B

“Marty Supreme” is rated R for language throughout, sexual content, some violent content/bloody images and nudity. Its running time is 150 minutes.

Contact Bob Garver at rrg251@nyu.edu.