Paper Tiger, 2026.
Written and Directed by James Gray.
Starring Miles Teller, Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson, Gavin Goudey, Roman Engel, Cindy Katz, Yavor Vesselinov, Victor Ptak, Dimiter D. Marinov, Raphael Corkhill, Roman Blat, Patrick Murney, Joel Marsh Garland, Michael Alix, Meredith Holzman, Rosslyn Luke, Grisha Reydler, Yelena Solovey, and Vadim Kroll.
SYNOPSIS:
Two brothers pursue the American Dream but get entangled in a dangerous Russian mafia scheme that terrorizes their family, testing their bond as betrayal becomes possible.
In writer/director James Gray’s 1980s Bronx transportation of Russian mafia threats and thrills, Paper Tiger (terminology essentially putting into question if someone is bluffing), Miles Teller’s Irwin is a modest engineer with an idyllic family life, married to Scarlett Johansson’s Hester (a serviceable physical transformation, albeit one that never truly lets the viewer forget who is performing) with two squabbling teenagers, college-bound Scott (Gavin Goudey) and Benjamin (Roman Engel). Adam Driver’s well-connected New York City hotshot Gary waltzes back into the family’s lives with a proposition for Irwin: start a contracting business to clean up a polluting canal, working alongside the Russians, who, in theory, shouldn’t be much of a problem. Gary also plays the piano expertly and always carries a firearm, which the boys are excited to see, so it’s clear they think their uncle is much cooler than their lame-o father, who is comfortable living within his means.
Except maybe Irwin isn’t as he is quick to take Gary up on his offer, certainly for his own ambitions, but perhaps also to show his children he can be more and that, by extension, the sky is the limit for them. Somewhere between not being very street-smart and eager to earn some approval from his kids, he takes the bookworms away from their studying to show them the sites he will be advising on, only to stumble into a trust-compromising situation between him, Gary, and the Russians who most definitely don’t want anyone pointing out safety hazards, for they are obviously up to something shady.
Surely, Gary should have known that they were getting in business with a ruthless bunch (in the early going, he seems to believe that they can be reasoned with, unlike the Mafia), but his long-standing decorated work with the NYPD and other actions within the city have rendered him a golden goose who can do no wrong in his mind. Adam Driver thrives as a slick talker, and does so here with the kind of charm that has one thinking like those two boys, in that this man is a charming badass with the upper hand (and that’s before the film brings him to a point where he is barging into Russian-owned small businesses and assaulting gangsters with his belt).
Regardless of what went through Gary’s head, the Russians are astronomically upset, demanding financial reparations to regain trust, while also sending goons into Irwin’s house at night as both an eerie threat and retaliation for crossing into personal territory. Always a masterful filmmaker and here working with cinematographer Joaquín Baca-Asay, it’s a sequence that allows for stunning usage of shadows and shots in darkness that remain visible. Another late sequence is even more spellbinding, more action-oriented, set in a field of tall grass and accentuated by the mixing of airplanes into the sound design; it’s a tremendously scintillating sequence that puts a satisfying cap on the mounting suspense.
Paper Tiger is more than the sum of those unpredictable thrills, though, as that escalating danger turns the screws toward themes of family, loyalty, honesty, trust, nobility, idolatry, and protection. Irwin is unquestionably in over his head, in what quickly turns into a cautionary tale on getting greedy with the American dream, whereas Gary has much to wrestle with regarding whether his own motives are pure or if he does love the swagger of it all, even if there is no disputing his love for his brother.
Subtly, the film is also about the dynamic between those two boys, how this scary situation brings them closer, and the benefits of sticking to education versus getting involved in real-world affairs where someone maybe doesn’t belong. Paper Tiger also keeps pulling on the thread of who, between the father and Gary, should be the role model, ending on a rather ironic note with a tongue-in-cheek line of dialogue. Beneath the looming Russian gangster threats and violence is another coming-of-age story from the filmmaker, adding a deep layer beneath the narrative surface.
As for Hester, Scarlett Johansson is unfortunately tasked with overplaying the role at times, leaning into histrionics while dealing with and hiding her own medical crisis. She makes the most of the material, and it does eventually tie into the A-plot, but it still feels superfluous, as if James Gray felt obligated to give the character something else to do. Her role becomes more interesting when she is backed into a corner and forced to choose between loyalty, family, and betrayal.
It is Adam Driver, though, who is given the most complex material and turns in a fittingly prickly performance that forces Gary to separate himself from the perception around him and look inward about his motives and actions, and whether or not he is willing to do the one thing it will take to fix this, which could compromise his entire carefully crafted persona. The family drama of Paper Tiger is a pressure cooker throughout, twisting its themes and characters into knots, propelling it toward a kinetic conclusion that never lets up on interrogating the Agamemnon quote it opens with. This one is anything but paper-thin.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Robert Kojder
