'Marty Supreme': The Price of Winning
Nominated for both the Academy Award for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay, and BAFTA for Best Film and Best Original Screenplay, Marty Supreme does something audacious: it gives us a sports film where the hero wins the final match, and that victory completes his damnation. Writers Ronald Bronstein and Josh Safdie have crafted something rare—a story where getting exactly what you want turns out to be the worst thing that could happen to you. In an era of predictable underdog narratives, here's a film that asks a more unsettling question: what if the real tragedy isn't losing, but winning at the cost of your soul?
The film opens in 1952 New York with Marty Mauser (Timothée Chalamet) working at his uncle's shoe store, and within minutes, we understand who he is. A customer asks for size 9 shoes. Marty brings out size 8s in a size 9 box. When they're painfully tight, he blames the brand—"runs really small"—and steers her toward a more expensive pair that actually fits. He's a con artist in a dead-end job, and he knows it. But Marty doesn't see himself as a shoe salesman—he's a table tennis player, training obsessively at Lawrence's Ping Pong Parlour in his spare time, ranked second in America, dreaming of the London tournament that could make his name. The sport becomes his salvation and his test. Table tennis offers something pure: direct competition where there's nowhere to hide, no teammates to blame, just you and your opponent and a ball moving too fast to think. When you win, it's because you're better. When you lose, there's no one else to fault. That purity is exactly what makes it the perfect stage for examining what happens when someone trades integrity for success. The game doesn't change—but Marty does, and not for the better.
After Marty loses spectacularly to a Japanese player named Koto Endo (Koto Kawaguchi) at the London tournament—humiliated by a new sponge paddle that absorbs power and returns it doubled—he meets Milton Rockwell (Kevin O'Leary), a wealthy American businessman. Over lunch at an expensive restaurant, Milton makes an offer: come to Japan, perform exhibition matches against Endo for his company's promotional events, receive a thousand dollars plus luxury accommodations and private plane travel. There's just one condition: Marty has to lose. Not compete—perform. Not play his best—play to a script. It's theatre, Milton explains, not sport. "Sometimes when you lose, you're a winner," he says with unsettling confidence. Marty initially refuses, indignant: "I'm not about to throw my reputation in the trash for you." But Milton plants a seed that's impossible to ignore: "You're the half-time show," he points out, referring to Marty's current gig performing trick shots for the Harlem Globetrotters between basketball games. Perhaps you're already a performer, rather than an athlete. The next time we see Marty, he's doing exactly what Milton wanted—touring venues across Europe and Asia, playing predetermined matches, living in nice hotels, getting paid. The contract was signed somewhere between that refusal and this compliance, in a moment the film wisely keeps off-screen. Because that's how these choices work: we rationalise them to ourselves before we can even articulate them to others.
What makes Marty so compelling is how completely writers Bronstein and Safdie understand what drives him. He's someone who measures his entire worth through winning and external validation. Watch how the opening fifteen minutes establish this: he cons the customer (winning through deception), trains ferociously (winning through skill), has an affair with Rachel (Odessa A'zion), a married woman in his building (winning through conquest), pitches an orange ping pong ball business idea to a potential investor (winning through entrepreneurship). He doesn't care about the method—only the outcome. When he loses to Endo, his response tells us everything. He doesn't study the new paddle or analyse what went wrong. He smashes his own racket, demands an immediate rematch, screams that Endo is "A FUCKING CHEATER" while photographers capture his rage. The need to win isn't about pursuing excellence—it's about protecting his ego from the unbearable reality of being second-best. This is why Milton's offer works so perfectly. It gives Marty a way to feel successful without having to face the harder question: can he actually beat Endo fairly? The tragedy—and the film builds this carefully—is that Marty could beat Endo. We eventually see him do it. But by the time he proves it, everything that would have made winning meaningful has been sold off.
Most sports films follow a clear Rocky arc: hero loses, trains, learns humility, returns transformed, wins. Marty Supreme shows us what happens when someone refuses every opportunity for that transformation. When Marty loses to Endo, he learns nothing—he blames the equipment and throws a tantrum. When Milton offers the devil's bargain, Marty insults Milton's dead son rather than examining his own compromised morals. When Rachel goes into premature labour while he's in Japan—we watch him get the phone call during his match—he finishes the point before dealing with it. The film gives Marty three clear chances to choose differently: athletic integrity over ego, honesty over money, love over his ambition. He fails all three tests. This isn't sloppy writing—it's the entire point. The screenplay shows us that change isn't inevitable. Some people, given every opportunity, simply refuse. They double down instead of opening up, accumulate instead of releasing, and force instead of allowing. Marty stays aggressive and ego-driven throughout, never surrendering control, never admitting vulnerability. By maintaining this rigid approach from beginning to end, he achieves his goals while destroying his capacity for joy.
The film's masterstroke comes late, and it's either going to work for you or seem absurd, depending on how committed you are to its mythology. Before the final Tokyo match, Milton tells Marty something impossible: "I was born in 1601. I'm a vampire. I've met a lot of Marty Mausers over the centuries. Some of them crossed me. They weren't straight; they weren't honest. And those are the ones that are still here. They're not happy, but they're still here." He means it literally. Milton is a four-hundred-year-old creature who collects talented people who've traded integrity for success. His business isn't really selling pens—it's accumulating souls. The pen company, the private planes, the luxury hotels, they're all just mechanisms for the real operation: finding ambitious people at their lowest moment and offering them everything they want at a price they won't understand until it's too late. His "wife," Kay (Gwyneth Paltrow), the 1930s film actress Marty has an affair with, appears to be another collected soul, still alive decades after her heyday. The genius of making this literal rather than metaphorical is that it clarifies what's usually left ambiguous in stories about selling out. When Milton warns Marty directly—"If you win, you're going to be here forever too. And you won't be happy, Marty. You won't ever be happy"—he's not speaking metaphorically about regret or guilt. He's describing an actual supernatural curse: eternal life without the capacity for joy. You'll be alive, successful, accomplished, and absolutely miserable, forever.
Marty breaks the contract. During the final exhibition match in Tokyo, he tells Endo—through a translator—that he wants to really play, not perform. "Let's give it meaning," he pleads. Endo agrees. The crowd goes wild. And Marty wins, 22-20, in a genuinely competitive match that proves he had the skill all along. The moment should be triumphant. Instead, we cut to Marty rushing to Bellevue Hospital in New York, where Rachel has given birth prematurely. He finds her sleeping, exhausted. Then he walks to the nursery and looks through the glass at his newborn daughter. The baby stretches, yawns, and lets out a tiny cry. And Marty suddenly bursts into tears, sobbing uncontrollably. The Tears for Fears song "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" plays over the scene, its lyrics unbearably ironic: Marty ruled the table, won the match, proved his supremacy. But the tears aren't cathartic relief—they're the curse activating. He can see the baby's beauty, recognise the innocence, and feel the love. What he can't do is experience happiness. Milton's punishment has begun. Marty will live forever, he'll never age, he'll keep all his skills—but joy is now impossible. He got exactly what he wanted: he won the match, proved he was better than Endo, and vindicated his talent. And in doing so, he completed his damnation.
What can we learn from Marty Supreme about how stories work? First, that you can write compelling drama about characters who refuse to change, if you're willing to show the consequences honestly. Transformation isn't mandatory for strong storytelling—sometimes the most powerful choice is to show what happens when transformation is refused. Second, that the middle of your story isn't just where things get worse—it's where your character makes the choice that determines everything afterwards. Marty's decision to sign with Milton happens in the space between scenes, which feels exactly right because the choices that damn us often occur in private moments we barely admit to ourselves. Third, that committing fully to your genre mythology—even when it seems extreme—can create mythic resonance rather than absurdity. The literal vampire isn't silly; it's honest about what's usually left implicit. Fourth, that you can have your protagonist win the final competition and still deliver devastating tragedy, if you've properly established what victory costs. The parallel cutting between Rachel's labour and Marty's match creates unbearable tension because we're watching him choose wrong in real-time. Most importantly, the most sophisticated structure means nothing without emotional commitment. The baby scene works because we understand: Marty has achieved everything and has nothing. That's not a clever twist—that's the horror of getting exactly what you wanted and discovering you chose wrong. The deepest tragedies aren't about losing what you love. They're about winning what you wanted and discovering it was never what you needed.
Fair Use/Fair Dealing Notice
Film stills from Marty Supreme (2025, directed by Josh Safdie) are copyright of A24, Central Pictures and IPR.VC, and are used here for criticism and commentary under fair dealing (UK) and fair use (US) provisions.
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