Films are entirely a personal journey.
The deeply intimate independents. The latest Marvel blockbusters. Any year’s “Oscar-baits.” Our reactions to any film will be filtered through each of our own lives, our lived experiences. A scene or a performance or a piece of the score or even a simple, solitary image may touch an individual viewer in ways that no other viewer on Earth can possible relate. And that’s the beauty of film, even those branded “bad” by the reviewing community. Somebody, somewhere will find something meaningful within that film.
That brings me to my intensely personal reaction to director James Gray’s own semi-autobiographical film Armageddon Time. Gray and I have almost nothing in common. He grew up in Queens, New York, in the 1980s. I was born on the coast of North Carolina in 1975. His family celebrated their Jewish heritage while mine ran fast and far from religion completely. And James Gray had a grandfather, one who loved him deeply and helped guide his future during an intensely impressionable period in his life.
I, on the other hand, had no such influence.
My mother’s father shot himself before I was born. Grief-stricken and likely very angry, my mother refused to attend his funeral. The shotgun he used to end his life was handed down as a bizarre family heirloom on my uncle’s side. But we don’t talk about any of that. My uncle is now gone, and my mother suffers from dementia. Pieces of my own history will soon be completely lost.
My father’s father died of lung cancer shortly after losing his wife to a rare protein deficiency that literally caused her to starve to death. All of this happened within the span of a year while my father attended (was forced into) military school. Thanks to brothers who refused to care for him, my father grew up quickly and harshly.
This shit sticks with you. Your experience changes you, and the past, whether you lived it or not, impacts you every day.
It’s with this mindset that Gray approaches Armageddon Time. He wants to tell you a story about who he was, about the people and events that shaped the man he would become. As a result, even if the film isn’t fully autobiographical (some events were changed), he has delivered a deeply personal, beautiful memory film that gives us an unsparing look at a specific place and time and the specific events that changed the trajectory of his life.
Paul Graff (Banks Repeta) is a precocious student living in Queens, New York, who befriends a troubled and badly mistreated Johnny (Jaylin Webb). Johnny introduces Paul to his pre-teen rebellion through classroom pranks and eventual pot smoking for which they’re both busted, leading Paul’s family to enroll him in an exclusive, all-white private school partially funded by the Trump family. Angry at his family and the school and really the world itself, Paul continues to lash out and makes foolish choices with his friend Johnny that eventually lands both of them in serious trouble. Only one will make it out.
The beauty of this film lives within its fully realized and deeply felt personal connections between the characters. Nothing within the film (save one shocking, brutally honest truth revealed at its end) feels exceptionally revelatory, but it’s a strong story told with panache and style by a brilliant cast of actors. Anne Hathaway and Jeremy Strong are exceptional as Paul’s parents, struggling with their own life goals, inadequacies, and emotional pain. Gray gives each actor the gift of a beautifully intimate moment where we see their performance live outside of the confines of the story itself. For Hathaway, it’s a sweet moment where she dances with her father (the astoundingly great Anthony Hopkins) in their small kitchen. For Strong, it’s a darker, more challenging moment toward the end of the film.
Gray also pulls seemingly impossible performances from child actors Repeta and Webb. Repeta is given the precocious brat role, and he dances the line between cloying/annoying and sympathetic very well. Webb, though, soars with his more challenging role as a young Black child given zero opportunities. His is the most painful performance, one that veers between deeply seeded resentment of racist teachers to the impossible hope of a dream to the painful realization that the world doesn’t work the same way for those not in power. As great as the main cast is in Armageddon Time, the film would simply not work without Webb’s deeply impactful performance.
That brings me to Anthony Hopkins’ work as Paul’s grandfather. Yes, Hopkins is a 2-time Oscar winner, but, here, he gives us again something new. This performance isn’t something he could have given with the same gravitas when he was younger. The older, perhaps slightly frail, version of Hopkins in Armageddon Time provides a deeply emotional anchor to the film. His work here is that of a consummate actor whose reading of the most innocuous lines are infused not only with love but also with the exhaustion of a long, challenging life. As soon as Hopkins appears onscreen, I immediately connected with the character. He is, after all, one of our very finest actors nearing the end of his life. He also, to me, represents something I will never know, that grandfatherly presence that comforts you without the burden of parenting you. His scenes with Repeta are pure magic. They send the film into a memorable, deeply felt place that few films successfully obtain. When he’s gone, his presence both lingers and is deeply missed.
That connection and realization brought me to tears multiple times during Armageddon Time. As a memory play, it achieves a balance between letting you into James Gray’s history while simultaneously asking you to flash back into your own history, seeking those same moments that changed you whether you realized it or not. I did not have the tumultuous childhood that James Gray did, but I revel in the opportunity he and his film afforded me to spend time in my own memories and family story. Yes, they were (and remain) painful to relive at times, but I’m increasingly grateful for the opportunities I was given to succeed, particularly as I become increasingly aware of the absence of those same opportunities with others across the world.
Ultimately, I may never know what it’s like to have a deep connection to a grandfather or even a grandfatherly figure. Fortunately, that cycle has been broken for my own children as they have similarly deep and personal relationships with their own grandparents. But for me and Armageddon Time, I can borrow that experience from James Gray. I can maybe for a few hours pretend that Anthony Hopkins fits that role, as crazy as it sounds. The opportunity, the experience, and the film itself brings me to tears still.
Armageddon Time opens nationally in theaters only on Friday, October 28.
