Such love earthquakes are the through line of Gray’s directorial career, which began with “Little Odessa” in 1994. One of cinema’s great homeboys, Gray grew up in Queens, and most of his films are set there or in Brooklyn, and they harrowingly address the financial strains, thwarted dreams, and frayed bonds of middle-class Jewish families like the one he grew up in—stressful, on the streets, and close to crime. His previous film, 2022’s “Armageddon Time”, which in my opinion is his most successful film to date, is like “Paper Tiger”, which is set in his hometown of Fresh Meadows. Set in 1980, the film makes frequent references to Ronald Reagan’s ongoing Presidential campaign and focuses on a family much like the one in “Paper Tiger”: a father named Irving, a contractor; a mother named Esther; and his two sons, the youngest transferring from public school to a nearby private day school dominated by a wealthy local family, the Trumps.
Gray envisioned “Paper Tiger” as a sequel to “Armageddon Time” but changed his plans after the actors Anne Hathaway and Jeremy Strong, who played the parents in the previous film, were unavailable. The two works come from the same origin, but their differences are very important. Strong’s Irving was harsher and more abrasive than Irwin; By contrast, Hathaway’s Esther, a schoolteacher, is relatively refined and educated, while Johansson’s counterpart sleeps with curlers in her hair like a relic of the pre-Beatles sixties; speaks with a Queens accent that could cut through metal; He keeps the family together with his life-worn intelligence and strong will. Yet he is not as worldly as the nerdy Irwin, revering him for his wealth of “facts and figures.”
But fires of anger burn beneath the surface of “Paper Tiger,” exemplified by the opening visit to Great Neck. Iris wants Hester and her family to move there; Hester objects, explaining that the boys’ college tuition must come first, but Irwin openly mocks: “Everyone here was born with a silver spoon in their mouth, or stole a silver spoon.” Iris, who sees suburban luxury as her daughter’s birthright, thinks Hester’s marriage is deteriorating. The Pearls are not poor, but they are burdened by expenses and frustrated by the comforts that are out of their reach, especially when their son is distracted by Gary’s ostentatious success. (“Why do we always have to buy crappy things and live crappy lives?” laments Scott, comparing his uncle’s Mercedes to his parents’ cars.)
Irwin’s encounter with the mob dispels his fantasy of easy money; instead, he packs the luggage and makes plans to get the family out of town for their safety. But “Paper Tiger” is much more than a tale of criminal violence that bursts the domestic bubble. This is a story of silences that stands in marked contrast to its predecessor. With its overtly political context, “Doomsday” is a discursive film full of memories and commentary, with rhetorical statements of ideology and history. There is a lot of conversation throughout “Paper Tiger,” but almost none of it includes cultural context, broader observation, or deeper thought; This is not a film of ideas. Instead, the heated dialogue is an expression of the family’s inner life and times.
Interviews with directors have become a familiar part of film promotion, but Gray’s interviews are different, often more akin to performance than conversation. A gifted impersonator, he is one of the funniest of filmmakers; I’ve been hoping for a long time that he would direct a comedy (he hasn’t directed it yet) and appear in it. But his talent for imitation comes across excitingly in the dialogue of “Paper Tiger,” which Gray wrote the script himself, adding an extra dimension to the autobiographical elements of the story. In both casual conversations and major confrontations, dialogue plays like a musical score of a language made of memories. The film’s brilliant street lyrical patter, iconic phrases and intonations amount to a tremendous act of world-building; a lost environment brought back to life by past clichés.
Many of these evocative speeches also prove to be evasive. When Gary’s prediction about the Gowanus venture turns out to be misleading, the consequences of this fateful misfortune quickly lead to other choices and secrets, turning a happy home and a stable marriage into a shrouded stage of devious plans, hidden agendas and devious adventures. Gary’s Mephistophelian charms break down the facades of business, law, and marriage, revealing the deep and irreparable loneliness that lurks beneath the basic bonds of life.