One Shot: Inside ‘Marty Supreme’s’ moment of truth

In Josh Safdie’s feverish ping-pong epic, Marty (Timothée Chalamet) breaks from his benefactor, pen tycoon Milton Rockwell (Kevin O’Leary), risking everything to erase an old defeat. “I love this moment when Marty suddenly realizes he cannot lie to the audience and he tries to convince everyone that it’s not the truth. That it’s better for both him and Endo [Koto Kawaguchi], and better for everyone that they play for real now. It’s a very beautiful statement against fakeness and fake news,” says “Marty Supreme” cinematographer Darius Khondji of a scene — filmed in Japan thanks to a last-minute financial save by producers — in which the table tennis prodigies are puppets in a staged advertisement. Khondji framed Marty’s accession with kinetic energy. “Josh wanted to get close to Marty because he’s realizing something very important is happening to him, so we didn’t want any crazy gimmicky angles that can make it supernatural. We wanted to film it very straightforward with the camera on his face and through his point of view,” he says. “And then there’s that final moment where Marty’s in the ambience of the stadium crowd embracing him, where all the people who love ping-pong are around him. It was a big step for him in the search of his identity of who he was.”