Marty Supreme + Zootopia 2

 

Marty Supreme

Score:  B

Directed by Josh Safdie

Starring Timothee Chalamet, Odessa A'zion, Gwyneth Paltrow, et al

Running time: 150 minutes

Rated R

Marty Supreme is an entertaining and, in some respects, well-made dramedy that ultimately falls short of its Oscar aspirations due to an erratic story and gratuitous bad behavior.  Ostensibly, Marty is about the titular character's (Chalamet) efforts to overcome a hard scrabble background to become a table tennis world champion.  But Marty is really more interested in attention of all kinds, using and abusing those around him to get what he is immediately desperate for, which is often just petty cash.  This makes the character, and overall story, quite similar to director Safdie's Uncut Gems (which he co-directed with his brother Benny).  Starring Adam Sandler, it is an excruciatingly unpleasant movie to watch; in purely technical cinema terms, it's a decent movie, but also full of nothing but despicable behavior and cursing.  Marty Supreme is fortunately milder in its bad behavior (and language) than Gems.  At least, the bad behavior is a little better excused.  Whereas Sandler gets his just deserts, though, Marty bungles his way to unearned moral victories by the end.  There are also quite a few secondary characters and stories that pop up and disappear at random, artificially portraying them as important or well understood components in the story (hawking orange ping-pong balls; a random "best friend" played by Tyler, the Creator who drops in and back out again; etc.).  It's not all bad, by any means.  Chalamet creates a compelling, if decidedly unheroic, main character who is fun to follow, and his foibles (escaping the cops, falling through a floor in a bathtub, etc.) can be quite humorous by themselves.  It's a long movie, but decent pacing prevents it from dragging.  But Marty leaves an awful lot of wreckage in his wake, particularly for those closest to him, and to what end?  These mixed and troubling themes created (intentionally or not) by the story and characters waste some genuinely high quality elements of filmmaking that are also present.

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Zootopia 2

Score:  B+

Directed by Jared Bush & Byron Howard

Starring Ginnifer Goodwin, Jason Bateman, Ke Huy Quan, Andy Samberg, et al

Running time: 108 minutes

Rated PG

Zootopia 2 is an entertaining, well-made animated movie that, like the original, offers far more for adult audiences than many in the genre; but it also can't quite match the first film's charm or, naturally, its originality.  The first thing that stands out to me about Z2, whether or not it's actually true, is that it feels more plot-based, and less about exploring the world and its characters than the original.  There is still some very good material in those latter categories in the sequel: in particular, the introduction of a backwater, ghetto-like reptile neighborhood, as well as continued development of the sweetly mismatched duo of Judy (Goodwin), an earnest and still rather naive bunny and Nick (Bateman), a streetwise and still rather jaded fox.  But the plot is kind of humdrum; Judy and Nick have to clear their good names while also investigating the mysteries of the maligned reptiles (hint: they're not as bad as the residents of Zootopia think).  The supporting characters, while fun to one degree or another, also aren't as strong as in the original.  The action scenes, while cleverly devised and beautifully animated, are also enjoyable, but get bogged down somewhat in the tangles of plot.  Again, a perfectly entertaining movie - for both adults, solo or parents, and children - that has Pixar-level quality in many ways, but I hope that the next one will ease up on the plotting and bask more in its vivid characters and setting.

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I think that these two movies will probably wrap up my 2025-released theater trips (unless a few Oscar-nominated movies come to my theater closer to the Academy Awards ceremony-hopefully!).  Solid movies both, although I think both are overrated, for different reasons.  Marty Supreme is considered a Best Picture contender, which I disagree with.  Yes, it has some elements of a top movie, but too many and too significant of flaws to put it in that category (however, Chalamet is a more deserving option for Best Actor).  Meanwhile, Zootopia 2 has surged to box office heights: while it's made modestly more in the U.S. than the original, it has almost doubled its international total to $1.275 billion (thanks mostly to $610 million in China)!  It thus follows the pattern of Inside Out: the sequel makes way more money than the outstanding original, even though it isn't nearly as good (IMO).  Oh, well.  2025 was a good, though not great, year at the movies, and I'll be writing my year-in-review posts in the coming month or so.  Until then, hopefully 2026 gets off to a good start!

* By Source, A24 - impawards, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=80723175

** By Source, Disney Enterprises, Inc. - https://dam.gettyimages.com/s/nbg894c5nz2fhkg5pkfwtpg, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=77592031