Marty Mauser is a young man who has a huge dream which no one understands or respects and he is willing to do just about anything to achieve that dream.
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Table Tennis. That’s right, that’s Marty’s dream. Everything he had been working towards was becoming the world number one and being the ultimate champion. He has a major issue though, he believes he is entitled to achieving that. He does not demonstrate anything about being humble.
The story is fully chaotic from start to finish, never think it is going to settle down as it just gets crazier with each scene. In a lot of ways that then made you actually laugh out loud, because it seemed to get even more ridiculous. The thing is though Marty isn’t even likeable, he’s a horrible narcissist character who we don’t even want to see suceed, but we are fully drawn into his crazy life and wondering if his sheer ruthlessness can actually achieve the dream.
Obviously I am not going to spoil the plot with any big reveals, but he really does have a lot of nerve for someone who is not all that special at all. The wild nature of his life also spills into his personal life, and somehow he is able to charm any woman he wants. I will give him some props for that, because how does he even manage it? Especially given Kay Stone is a former high profile actress.
I guess something we can learn from Marty is that over confidence can really play off big time if you just believe in yourself more than anything else. Overall, alongside Marty pretty much every single character is flawed and not likeable at all, I mean except poor Dion got to feel sorry for that guy. I honestly hated Rachel as well, another not nice character it’s strange to watch a film and not actually be rooting for anyone to win.
The true genius behind the film by Josh Safdie is that the wild ride did not really feel that long and I always feel that can be one of the greatest compliments to a film with a running time of 2 hours and 30 minutes, to not actually feel that long.
Timothée Chalamet is a force against nature and constantly continues to impress everyone with his acting ablity, surely it is only a matter of time before he picks up his first Oscar? Quite frankly, it could well be for this film and whenever that happens for him he will deserve it. I could get behind a campaign for this role, as surely disliking a character that much but still being curious has to say a lot about his performance?
Gwyneth Paltrow was impressive in a supporting role but I think the biggest credit for that has to go to Kevin O’Leary in his first ever feature film performance, I honestly didn’t even realise that he wasn’t an actor. Odessa A’zion has some decent scenes as well.
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I have to tell you that I HATED this film, and your review captures why as you point out how dislikable he is…living in the US, I call him the “Trump Of Table Tennis”: he is a con man, thief, liar, cheat, and he spouts off the most offensive comments with no shame or humility. I hated his character, his motivations and his callousness. There was NOTHING to admire, and I hated spending that much time with him. But I say that because I live in FRUMPworld which is all of this and more in real life. But great review as always!
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I can fully understand that, the character was horrendous and well all of the characters. I will admit that I was left wondering throughout if it was actually based on a real person!
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