Armageddon Time is a movie written and directed by James Gray, starring Michael Banks Repeta, Anne Hathaway, Jeremy Strong and Anthony Hopkins.
A well presented story, perfectly coordinated, balanced and magnificently interpreted. So tender yet bitter, which Gray has rendered onto film with the perfectly measured amount of drama.
Premise
Set in Queens, New York in the early 1980’s, it tells the story of Paul, a boy with a Jewish background who befriends his rebellious classmate Johnny, a Black American. Their friendship is not welcome by Paul’s family, and he has to face the truth of inequality and prejudice.
Movie Review
A wonderfully sober feature for film critics, yet rather slow and melancholy for the audience at large. So, we should probably side with both, thinking that it is not James Gray’s pretension to make a movie that will become a mass phenomenon with this number, ‘Armageddon Time’.
It is a subtle movie that portrays a society from the inside, and counts on a realistic screenplay, formulated with balance and tact.
In this feature it is the performances that prime, at times retrained, with its persistent underlying drama, and a screenplay that picks up on all the subtleties allowing the story to flow at a paced tempo, and in which the characters, the actors and the spectators seem to be comfortable, almost contented, to then destroy and rip it apart stating that “the American dream” is no longer, both in the in the characters, in the family, in the community, and in the symbol of all symbols, the Empire State building which can be discerned from afar.
This is a movie that is devastatingly effective, that does not need nor want extra effects thanks to the magnificent screenplay, the equally magnificent performances, and that conveys a sincerity of a story that begged to be told. If not for the wider audience, then for the cinematographic records.
Director
James Gray
James Gray (born April 14, 1969; New York City) is an American film director and screenwriter. Gray was born in New York City and grew up in the neighborhood of Flushing. He is of Ukrainian-Jewish descent, with grandparents from Ostropol, Western Ukraine. The original family name was “Grayevsky”. His father was once an electronics contractor. Gray attended the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts, where his student film, Cowboys and Angels, helped him get an agent and the attention of producer Paul Webster, who encouraged him to write a script which he could produce. As a child growing up in Queens, New York, Gray aspired to be a painter. However, when introduced in his early teenage years to the works of various filmmakers, including Francis Ford Coppola, Gray’s interests expanded to the art of filmmaking. The Yards returned Gray to Queens where the story takes place. Read More
Cast
 Banks Repeta / Paul Graff |  Anne Hathaway / Esther Graff |  Jeremy Strong / Irving Graff |
 Anthony Hopkins / Aaron Rabinowitz |  Teddy Coluca / Uncle Louis |  Tovah Feldshuh / Mickey Graff |
 Marcia Jean Kurtz / Guide |  Andrew Polk / Mr. Turkeltaub | Jaylin Webb / Johnny Davis Ryan Sell / Ted Graff |
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