Armageddon Time
“Armageddon Time’s autobiographical nature should not be a pass for crafting hollow Black and female characters.”
Title: Armageddon Time (2022)
Director: James Gray 👨🏼🇺🇸
Writer: James Gray 👨🏼🇺🇸
Reviewed by Weiting 👩🏻🇨🇳🇺🇸
Technical: 3.5/5
Boasting a centerpiece celebration at this year’s New York Film Festival, Armageddon Time is James Gray’s most personal and political film to date. This melodrama recounts his adolescence in 1980s Queens, New York City. Aiming to tackle the thorny dynamics of racial unrest during the Reagan administration, the film uses its protagonist Paul Graff (Banks Repeta)—Gray’s autobiographical 6th grade self—as a window for us to peek into larger society.
Gray constructs the period setting with the finest attention to detail, reminiscent of Paul Thomas Anderson’s recent (and similarly nostalgic) coming-of-age story, Licorice Pizza (2021). Grungy graffiti on subway trains feel true to the time and place, expertly guided through the naturalistic lens of veteran cinematographer Darius Khondji (Anima, The Immigrant). But Gray goes one step further by presenting the era’s sociopolitical landscape sans rose-tinted glasses, including the ugly racism he saw and class struggles he experienced.
The result is a well-paced family chronicle featuring a stellar cast of Paul’s close-knit (if at times dysfunctional) Jewish household, anchored by one of the most profound recent performances by Anthony Hopkins as Grandpa Aaron Rabinwitz. Besides Paul and Aaron, however, other supporting characters in this ensemble lack foundation and substance. While Gray’s previous works either defy genres (Ad Astra) or provide singularly acute social observations (The Immigrant), he offers us neither in this film.
Gender: 2/5
Does it pass the Bechdel Test? NOPE
Anne Hathaway delivers a well-researched performance of Paul’s mother Esther, who juggles myriad domestic and social duties. The workload clearly takes its toll given her ever-frazzled state, and she receives little acknowledgement beyond some encouraging words: During a dinner scene, her husband Irving (Jeremy Strong) and Paul voice their support for her career pursuits on the school committee. But this is about the only progressive depiction of the household’s gender dynamics.
On top of the cooking and cleaning that is expected of her, Esther takes on an excruciating amount of emotional labor as the mediator between Paul, the impulsive son, and Irving, the abusive father. What’s worse, she acquiesces to her husband’s methods of corporal punishment, even encouraging it such as when Paul is caught smoking weed at school. These scenes acknowledge the terror of patriarchy that ruled Gray’s upbringing, but by leaving Esther with a thin backstory—written only into the middle of toxic father-son conflicts—she remains silenced.
It feels like a shame, because a healthy father-daughter relationship sits between Esther and Grandpa Aaron, ripe for mining. We see Esther enjoying a casual dance with him, or weeping over his waning health. Hathaway’s performances in these scenes, though fleeting, add complexity to Esther’s emotions and leave us wanting more meaningful dialogue between the two characters. With small tweaks, Esther could have easily become multidimensional.
Race: 2/5
Armageddon Time reveals its greatest weakness through Paul’s friendship with public school classmate Johnny Davis (Jaylin Webb), a stereotypical Black character who lives on welfare with his grandma. Gray makes well-intentioned but ultimately superficial commentary on race and class by setting up clichéd situations. For example, he consciously exposes Paul’s white privilege as a foil to the systemic racism that Johnny endures on all fronts. When Paul and Johnny clown around during class, their 6th grade teacher ejects Johnny from the room but only gives Paul a warning. Outside of school, Johnny faces yet more persecution when the two friends get arrested for stealing a computer from Paul’s new private school. The police take both of them into custody, both confess to committing the theft—but the white officers let Johnny take all the blame, because Paul’s father, Irving, knows one of the officers personally.
Yes, these scenarios ring true, not least because Gray experienced some of them himself in real life. But the rote way they’re depicted on screen bear little artistic or sociopolitical value. Gray’s white perspective remains ever-present, reducing Johnny to flat caricature. And even though Webb brilliantly balances both vulnerability and dignity in his performance, he could have shone more given a meatier backstory to work with.
All the while, a white protagonist’s motives and emotions receive the spotlight during these scenes of racial conflict. While it’s positive that Gray attempts to tackle race in Armageddon Time, he simply lacks the skill or empathy required to craft interesting characters outside his own lived experience.
Bonus for Age: +0.50
Grandpa Aaron, played by 84-year-old Hopkins, is extraordinarily well-written and the heartwarming chemistry between Paul and him feels personal, but universally human. As the backbone and moral compass of Paul’s imperfect family, Aaron proves to be a force of nature, yet a gentle breeze of love and affection at the same time. Hopkins brings the best out of all other actors who share his scenes.
There is a hauntingly beautiful scene where Aaron sits on a park bench, quietly watching Paul shoot up a toy rocket into the sky. Its simultaneous serenity and melancholy could not have hit us this potently if not for Hopkins’ transformative performance, one that seems to draw on years of life and acting experience.
Mediaversity Grade: C- 2.67/5
A mixed bag of bittersweet retrospection and white mediocrity, Armageddon Time is only unmissable for the saving grace that is Anthony Hopkins. Its mishandling of Johnny’s story arc feels particularly uninspired, and the film’s autobiographical nature should not be Gray’s pass for crafting hollow Black and female characters.
Like Armageddon Time? Try these other semi-autobiographical films.
Licorice Pizza (2022)
Jezebel (2019)
Sing Street (2016)