James Gray treads familiar territory of family ties, fatherhood and the Russian mob with Paper Tiger, starring Miles Teller, Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson, screening at the 2026 BFI London Film Festival. A beautiful film with fantastic atmosphere, hurt by a noticeably weak link.
Plot in a nutshell
Queens, New York, 1986. Engineer and devoted family man Irwin Pearl (Teller) is persuaded by his charismatic brother Gary (Driver) to partner up with him on a business opportunity with some Russians. After one fateful night, Irwin and his family start getting threats, and the brothers both realize they’re in over their heads with the Russian mafia.
The Review
In my review of The Dreamed Adventure, I mentioned the importance of having a strong visual language and how the film drags when it lacks that — even if the storytelling core is strong. James Gray’s latest family crime drama is almost the complete inverse of that. He has a very established visual language, and it’s one which I could sit in for days without feeling an ounce of boredom. The man could direct a shampoo commercial, and if it had the kind of butter-smooth scene transitions and intimate warm white cinematography that’s part of Gray’s visual signature, I’d be totally absorbed.
And absorbed I was from start to finish with Paper Tiger. The 1980s Queens setting, during the twilight years of the Cold War period, is meticulously recreated in the design. It’s instant transportation. The director of photography, Joaquín Baca-Asay, who worked with Gray twice before, on We Own The Night (2007) - a crime drama pitting one family against the Russian Mafia in New York… sound familiar? - and Two Lovers (2008) - Gray’s most romantic and intimate film - is well-versed with the look and feel Gray is going for, and the result is a spectacular, vintage palette. As if filtered through both personal and film history nostalgia; one scene in particular when Irwin’s home is broken into in the middle of the night features some of the most visually striking play with light and shadow I’ve seen in years.
The acting from Teller and Driver is exceptional, believable and authentic to the core; you buy them as brothers living in the 1980s hook, line and sinker. The two young boys who play Irwin’s sons are also superb, as if plucked from exactly that time period. Scarlett Johansson, unfortunately, ends up being the most noticeable of weakest links. Her Linda is not in sync with the film’s tone and timbre, and as a character who is the center of the film’s subplot that makes some eyebrow-raising choices, it’s a combination of bad writing and a performance so hammy it borders on cringe.
Johansson’s inauthentic performance aside, there’s more than enough in Paper Tiger that’ll satisfy James Gray fans. The foreboding atmosphere builds with tension wonderfully, and there’s a raw emotional undercurrent of power in the final scene that puts the entire film into a perspective in a way that only cinema can.