‘Marty Supreme’ is Firing on All Cylinders

December 18, 2025

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He’s Supreme-ing all over the place! (CREDIT: A24)

Starring: Timothée Chalamet, Gwyneth Paltrow, Odessa, A’zion, Kevin O’Leary, Tyler Okonma, Abel Ferrara, Fran Drescher, Koto Kawaguchi, Sandra Bernhard, Spenser Granese, Luke Manley, John Catsimatidis, Isaac Mizrahi, George Gervin, Ted Williams, Emory Cohen, Géza Röhrig, Larry “Ratso” Sloman, Ralph Colucci, Penn Jillette

Director: Josh Safdie

Running Time: 150 Minutes

Rating: R for Plenty of Language, Inescapable Violence, and Some Embarrassing Nudity

Release Date: December 19, 2025 (Limited Theaters)/December 25, 2025 (Expands Nationwide)

What’s It About?: Marty Mauser (Timothée Chalamet) could just be the biggest deal in the world of 1950s global athletics. That’s how transcendent his table tennis skills are. Now you may be thinking, “Table tennis? Measly old ping pong? What are you getting on about?” Well, Marty doesn’t have any patience for your skepticism. In fact, he doesn’t have patience for much of anything. On the rare occasions when he loses, he throws a fit about how his opponents aren’t playing the game properly. And when he’s back home in New York City in between tournaments, he’s getting up to all sorts of trouble, much of it of his own making. He’s being pulled in a million different directions, by a colorful cast of characters who are equally charmed and enervated by him. They include his very pregnant childhood friend (Odessa A’zion) who’s married to someone else but claims that the baby is his; a faded movie star (Gwyneth Paltrow) he’s trying to mack on; her control freak husband (Kevin O’Leary, aka Shark Tank‘s “Mr. Wonderful”) who could also be his sponsor; his uncle (Larry “Ratso” Sloman) who tries to get him arrested to teach him a lesson; some random criminal (Abel Ferrara) who puts Marty in charge of his beloved dog; and his taxi driver friend (Tyler Okonma, aka Tyler, the Creator) who gets strung along for the ride. Meanwhile, his mother (Fran Drescher) is caught in the background looking incredulous.

What Made an Impression?: I Probably Would’ve Fallen Asleep: There are some movies that I’m afraid to talk about too in depth when reviewing them because I don’t want to spoil anything. Marty Supreme is similar but profoundly different: I don’t want to say too much because I could easily end up just listing all the plot details without providing any analysis. This is a dense flick that also manages to whiz by despite its two-and-a-half-hour running time. Ostensibly a sports drama, it’s also just as much a crime caper, screwball comedy, and lovingly realized period piece. And each slice of the pie delivers.
That Boy Can Ball: But let’s be clear, even though the plot isn’t all ping pong all the time, Chalamet came to play. There are no half-measures with this thespian. He’s expressed his desire to be one of the all-time greats, and he’s clearly compelled to impress his audience. But this isn’t joyless Method acting, instead it only makes us hungry for more. Just as he served as a musical guest on SNL after playing Bob Dylan, I wouldn’t put it past him to show up paddle in hand for the 2028 Los Angeles Summer Games.
A Champion for the Ages: To sum it all up, Marty Supreme is one of the most unmissable cinematic experiences of the year, a runaway train that careens off the tracks all the way to Jupiter. And a bang-up entertainer like this delivers an appropriately propulsive soundtrack, with Oneohtrix Point Never delivering one of his typical mind-melting scores, while some needle drops from the ’80s offer temporal displacement that somehow doesn’t feel anachronistic. Give yourself time and space to breathe after this one, you’re gonna need it.

Marty Supreme is Recommended If You: Wish that Uncut Gems had been more like Forrest Gump (or vice versa)

Grade: 4.5 out of 5 Orange Ping Pong Balls

‘Roofman’ Brings the Energy to Blow the Top Off Multiplexes

October 10, 2025

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Is the Roofman on fire? You’ll have to watch the movie to find out! (CREDIT: Paramount Pictures)

Starring: Channing Tatum, Kirsten Dunst, Peter Dinklage, Lakeith Stanfield, Ben Mendelsohn, Uzo Aduba, Juno Temple, Emory Cohen, Melonie Diaz, Molly Price, Lily Collias, Kennedy Moyer, Tony Revolori, Jimmy O. Yang

Director: Derek Cianfrance

Running Time: 126 Minutes

Rating: R for A Brief Sex Scene and a Goofy Nude Scene (Not During the Sex)

Release Date: October 10, 2025 (Theaters)

What’s It About?: Roofman presents Channing Tatum embodying the true story of Jeffrey Manchester, whose nom de criminality serves as the title of this film. We meet Jeffrey as a restless Army veteran who wants to be a better provider for his kids. So he resorts to robbing a series of McDonald’s in the Charlotte, North Carolina area by cutting through their roofs during their unoccupied hours. Eventually he’s caught and charged for his spree, but soon enough he escapes prison and hides out in a local Toys “R” Us store to plan his next big move. He somehow manages to evade capture long enough to assume a new identity and start dating a single mother named Leigh (Kirsten Dunst) that he meets after wandering into a church one day. As his wild story presses on apace, we’re left to wonder: maybe he’ll decide to settle down and live an honest life. Or perhaps instead, all his misdeeds will actually finally catch up to him.

What Made an Impression?: I’m going to do this review a little differently than my usual style by starting off with the question: Should YOU want to be the Roofman? I won’t keep you in suspense, though. The answer is: no, you should not.

So is that the end of the review? Well, let’s get a little more nuanced. By most accounts that I’ve come across, the real Jeffrey Manchester is fantastically charming, and Tatum certainly plays him that way. I found myself instinctively rooting for everything to work out in his favor, but then I caught myself enough to recognize that that’s not exactly the most defensible position. Jeffrey doesn’t just break the letter of the law, he also breaks the spirit. And while he does his best to eschew violence in the course of his misdeeds, some people do get hurt. Plus, he’s not exactly a Robin Hood where only Billionaire Big Business is getting hurt. So if you do find yourself rooting for him, I’d recommend redirecting that energy towards hoping that he’s given the opportunity to atone for his schemes and put his talents to better use.

And the Roofman does indeed have some considerable talents. He’s observant, thoughtful, and fun to be around. The trouble is, of course, that he too often utilizes those qualities in service of some very combustible misconduct. This is a tricky movie to watch, partly because it’s also a very easy movie to watch. On the surface level, it’s charming and exciting, which could lure you into a trap of glamorizing some bad behavior. Now, it’s not terribly difficult to avoid that trap, but what’s perhaps a little more challenging is finding the right balance when sorting out the admirable and the heinous within someone like Jeffrey Manchester. It makes sense that he found his way to a house of worship, because he’s clearly a sinner who also has some amount of desire to be better. You don’t have to be religious yourself to be inspired by this movie, but whatever your preferred belief system (or lack thereof), I think one of the biggest takeaways from this story is the eternal power of grace, even when (or perhaps especially when) things get out of hand.

Grade: 4 out of 5 Peanut M&Ms

‘The Bikeriders’ Review: Looking for Whatever Comes Their Way

June 18, 2024

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Going whole hog (CREDIT: Kyle Kaplan/Focus Features. © 2024 Focus Features. All Rights Reserved.)

Starring: Jodie Comer, Austin Butler, Tom Hardy, Mike Faist, Michael Shannon, Norman Reedus, Boyd Holbrook, Damon Herriman, Beau Knapp, Emory Cohen, Karl Glusman, Happy Anderson

Director: Jeff Nichols

Running Time: 116 Minutes

Rating: R for Fist Fights, Knife Fights, and a Few Guns

Release Date: June 14, 2024 (Theaters)

What’s It About?: In 1960s Chicago, a man named Johnny (Tom Hardy) starts hearing the Call of the Hog. He then founds the Vandals MC motorcycle club, and pretty soon his motley crew are devoting their entire social lives to the open road and brawl-filled picnics. Threatening to upend it all is a hothead named Benny (Austin Butler), who holds an irresistible pull over the outsider Kathy (Jodie Comer). Everyone tried to warn Kathy away from Benny, but they just can’t help but marry each other. The Bikeriders was inspired by a book of the same name by photojournalist Danny Lyon, so the movie is framed by Mike Faist as Danny interviewing the major players in this subculture.

What Made an Impression?: Just Something to Do: Strangely enough, Johnny never appears to be particularly enthralled by motorcycles. Instead, he seems to have been attracted by what they represent, and even that motivation is rather haphazard. One day, he just happened to be watching the 1953 biker flick The Wild One, which features Marlon Brando infamously uttering “Whaddya got?” when someone asks him what he’s rebelling against. Johnny doesn’t seem particularly constrained by his suburban life as a husband and father (from what little we see of him in that role), but he’s nevertheless inexplicably and unmistakably drawn to the siren song of rebellion. Meanwhile, Benny at least clearly relishes his time cruising down the street, but that love is surely too elemental for him to ever explain where it comes from. At least Michael Shannon as Zipco offers some sort of life philosophy in the form of resenting his “pinko” brother. But that characterization is just as mystifying when you realize that “pinko” to him doesn’t mean “Communist” so much as “attends college” and “doesn’t do enough hard labor.”
No Way to Fathom It: The contrast between Johnny and Benny had me thinking of the yin-yang dynamic between the Salvatore Brothers on The Vampire Diaries. If you’ve never seen that CW bloodsucker series, here’s what you need to know: Damon Salvatore is the dangerous Benny, while Stefan Salvatore is the less frightening Johnny. Eventually, though, in both TVD and The Bikeriders, our initial assumptions get flipped on our head. The analogue is far from a perfect one-to-one match, but the point is that The Bikeriders left me flummoxed by the seeming randomness of its characters’ fates. Some of the Vandals who are perpetually in Death’s crosshairs somehow survive, while others who are ostensibly impenetrable bite the dust, and yet others reform themselves out of nowhere or at least disappear. It’s all fairly believable, but too thoroughly matter-of-fact to leave much of an impression.

The Bikeriders is Recommended If You Like: Laconic conversations, Wild accent swings, Impulsiveness

Grade: 3 out of 5 Motorcycles

‘Blue Bayou’ Tells a Tender and Painful Tale of Deportation Limbo

September 14, 2021

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Blue Bayou (CREDIT: Focus Features)

Starring: Justin Chon, Alicia Vikander, Mark O’Brien, Linh Dan Pham, Sydney Kowalske, Vondie Curtis-Hall, Emory Cohen

Director: Justin Chon

Running Time: 112 Minutes

Rating: R for Adult Language and Up-Close Violence

Release Date: September 17, 2021 (Theaters)

Blue Bayou should spur many people to a very specific action: if you were born outside the United States and adopted by an American family, check your citizenship status as soon as you can! I doubt that you’re in as much danger as tattoo artist Atonio LeBlanc (Justin Chon, also the writer and director), but that’s not a risk worth taking.

As a message delivery system, Blue Bayou is clear and effective. But how does it work as an experience to be viewed and digested for a couple of hours? Well, that’s what I’m here to write about, isn’t it? I can tell you this for sure: Chon is a compelling screen presence. He’s been doing his thing on movies and TV for about a decade and a half, but I’m pretty sure this is my first time encountering him (save for a guest spot on an episode of New Girl, apparently). And it’s not hard to care about Antonio’s predicament, considering how blatantly unfair it is. He was adopted from Korea when he was three years old, making Louisiana very much the only home he’s ever known. But because of a quirk in American law, he’s not actually a citizen, and that combined with his criminal record suddenly makes him a target for deportation, thereby threatening to tear him apart from his pregnant wife Kathy (Alicia Vikander) and beloved stepdaughter Jesse (Sydney Kowalske).

A lot of Blue Bayou is powerfully painful, as Antonio is tortured not just by a racist bureaucracy, but also by the scars of his abusive foster childhood. Then there are also the other everyday stressors like a mother-in-law who thinks he’s too much of a burden for her daughter, as well as Sydney’s police officer dad Ace (Mark O’Brien), who’s trying to sneak his way back into the picture against everyone’s wishes. And on top of all that is Ace’s violently unpredictable partner Denny (Emory Cohen), who may just be the biggest threat of all.

Amidst all the instability (and humidity), some moments of the random beauty of everyday life manage to shine through. That’s certainly clear in Antonio’s tender relationship with Jesse, which is filled with motorcycle rides and traversing swampland. But what ultimately sets Blue Bayou apart as something truly unique are Antonio’s encounters with Parker (Linh Dan Pham), a woman dying of cancer who becomes an unlikely customer and confidant. She comes from a family of Vietnam War refugees, and she has plenty to teach Antonio about accepting his fate by virtue of simply being her openhearted self. To sum it all up, there’s a lot of empathy being generated by this movie, and that makes for a fulfilling viewing experience.

Blue Bayou is Recommended If You Like: The personal meeting the political

Grade: 3.5 out of 5 Tattoos