Miles Teller & Adam Driver Shine in James Gray’s Underwhelming Crime Drama [Cannes]

American director James Gray has a remarkable eye for exploring human behavior on screen, especially when it comes to familial dynamics. In Ad Astra, the director used a trip through the solar system to evaluate a broken father-son relationship. In Armageddon Time, he set his sights on the pursuit of the American Dream pieced together by a strong family bond. So, it’s extremely disappointing, to say the least, that his latest, Paper Tiger, takes similar concepts and does the absolute bare minimum with them.

Set in 1986, his story follows the Pearl family in Queens, New York. Irwin (Miles Teller) and his wife Hester (Scarlett Johansson) haven’t made it big, but they’re living comfortably while raising their two sons, Ben (Roman Engel) and Scott (Gavin Goudey). Life is sweet and enjoyable for this family of four. Scott’s turning 18 years old and will be off to college soon, so there’s plenty for them to celebrate. Then, in comes Gary (Adam Driver), an ex-NYPD officer who is doing very well for himself in retirement, with a business proposition for his brother Irwin.

Gary has his sights set on the Gowanus Canal, an oil-polluted waterway that would require engineering expertise and careful obedience of the city’s laws and regulations. It also happens to be occupied by a dangerous Russian crew, now that the Italian mafia’s control of the city has subsided. Gary wants Irwin to use his engineering background so they can pursue a piece of the pie as consultants. If it isn’t clear by now, shady dealings plague this entire business venture, which eventually causes strife between the two brothers.

Paper Tiger’s Half-Baked Themes & Characters Are The Real Disappointment

Early on in Paper Tiger, Gray sets the stage for an intense story to play out exactly how one would expect. This predictability isn’t the inherent problem with this feature, however. Sure, no one ever hopes to walk into a film fully capable of predicting how things will transpire, but there are worse experiences. The true disappointment is that the journey toward the inevitable outcome feels underbaked. The themes of brotherhood explored are so surface level, and every character so one-dimensional, that it’s hard to care about anything happening to or around them.

The brotherhood theme led to the biggest source of frustration for me. Even when Gary first enters the picture, it’s clear that he’s reaching out to Irwin because he wants something, masking it as a surprise visit over dinner to Hester and their teenagers, who clearly look up to him. We don’t know these brothers outside their pursuit of this business deal until later, during a heated argument, when Gary vents his frustrations about taking care of Irwin growing up. Spending more time on their relationship dynamic would have landed better.

The individual characters also seem to be lacking depth to the point where this all feels like a terribly written spoof. At one point, Gary’s cop buddy teases him about being a boy scout and doing everything by the book. Yet, for the majority of the film, we see the direct opposite: shady deals with the Russians; lying to the authorities when he’s caught in a blunder. Perhaps, this is merely Gray’s commentary on not truly knowing the people we surround ourselves with, but this conversation begins and ends there, refusing to extend this notion to Gary’s own family.

Despite The Limited Script, Paper Tiger’s A-List Cast Bring The Heat

As many gripes as I have with Paper Tiger, it almost relieves me to share its positives, scarce though they may be. Gray captures the setting and time period well, which ultimately help to build intensity during heightened scenes with the Russians. The acting, for the most part, also felt fluid and natural. Teller carried the majority of the film on his back. Driver is reliably charming as Gary, though the dialogue didn’t do him any favors. Finally, Johansson felt criminally underused and tossed aside, only to be given a side story about her health, seemingly as an afterthought.

In all, the most frustrating aspect of Paper Tiger is that there’s an exceptional film here somewhere. The budding tension was magnificent, to the point where the action that followed felt like a giant sigh of relief. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t enough – so much so that the 115-minute runtime felt entirely too short. Frankly, this is the type of film you see for the performances and nostalgic setting of 1980s New York, and you shouldn’t expect to get much more out of it.

Paper Tiger screened at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival.

Release Date

May 16, 2026

Runtime

116 minutes

Director

James Gray

Writers

James Gray

Producers

Anthony Katagas, Jeff Rice, Raffaella Leone, Rodrigo Teixeira, Andrea Bucko, Lee Broda, Riccardo Maddalosso, Gary Farkas