The American hustler has a long history on screen. Add in some raw, brutal 1970s-style New York characterisation – think Robert de Niro or Al Pacino, and you start to get on track to describe the mercurial Marty Mauser, Timothée Chalamet’s complex table tennis champion, star of the must-see, magnificent, old-fashioned caper, Marty Supreme. Loosely based on the life of 1950s table tennis star, Marty “The Needle” Reisman, director Josh Safdie takes us on a breath-taking, non-stop, epic 150-minute American-dream adventure that’s sure to clean up at the next awards season.

It’s 1952 in New York and 23-year-old aspiring table tennis champion Marty works in his uncle’s shoe shop on the poor Lower East Side. He’s an impulsive, rude, wheeler-dealer, whether it’s persuading his customers to buy more expensive shoes, or sneaking off to have sex in the stock room with Rachel (Odessa A’zion), a married childhood friend he’s seeing on the side. Money is tight for everyone post-war, and Marty needs money to fund his trips to London and Tokyo for the forthcoming table tennis championships. His uncle, Murray (Larry ‘Ratso’ Sloman), wants him to become the store manager and withholds some wages to try to incentivize Marty into accepting the role. Marty is, however, not interested, and in the first of a series of crazy, madcap decisions with huge consequences, pulls a gun on a colleague to get the money owed to him out of the store’s safe. This sets off a chain of screwball events that take us from suburban NY’s subterranean sports gambling dens to the Ritz Hotel in London, in a race against time to get to a tournament in Japan. An array of characters pop up to aid or hinder his passage, including an admirable return to film by Gwyneth Paltrow, who plays Kay Stone, a jaded film star he manages to bed and bring on board to aid his passage. Tyler the Creator plays Wally, a fellow grifter and partner-in-crime, and Luke Manley plays Dion, Marty’s long-suffering business partner in the development of an orange table tennis ball. There are cameos for Abel Ferrara, Sandra Bernhard and Fran Drescher. Kevin O’Leary plays Paltrow’s husband who ends up spanking Chalamet’s bare bottom. The real-life Japanese table tennis champion Koto Kawaguchi plays Koto Endo, Marty’s arch rival.

The lean, hyper-active, super-driven, risk-taking, overly self-confident Marty drags his crew along for the ride, often reluctantly, but it’s a testament to his inner charm and charisma that they all stick with him through the chaotic thick and thin. He’s complex, tiresome, frustrating, and breaks every norm, but a poor Jewish boy from the Lower East Side post-war isn’t going to get anywhere by playing the rules. It’s a great insight into American negotiation and deal-making, and underneath the sometimes thoughtless, callous behaviour lies a good heart. Chalamet is superb, the slight man punches high, has real table tennis skills, is equally cheeky, sexy and frustrating, and seems a world away from the shy boy in 2017’s Call Me by You Name. The casting is excellent with an array of very real-looking people, a refreshing change to the TikTok and Instagram perfection of our times. The film takes us back to a time when people seemed to have more character and individuality. Remember when New Yorkers used to shout at each other? A sharp script reminds us that it’s only seven years since the end of the war, including a peppering of anti-semitic comments by Jewish-boy Marty that will cause a few intakes of breath, and concentration camp anecdotes from Bela (Geza Roehrig), a fellow player. The energy is complemented by a soundtrack that’s as wacky as the plot, ranging from 80s gems from Tears for Fears, Public Image, New Order and Peter Gabriel, through to 1950s tracks from Fats Domino and Perry Como and on to the Czech National Symphony Orchestra. The two and a half hours flew by. You may already be sick of hearing about this film, but trust me, Safdie has done himself proud, it’s worth the hype.

10/10