2023-08-24 11:02:12
Paul Graff leads a quiet childhood in the New York suburbs, along with Johnny, a classmate excluded because of his skin color. Following an incident, Paul is sent to a private school where he encounters elitism and racism that will forever change his life. (HBO Max)
Filmmakers have long used his work to explore their own childhood in a feature film. Some have done it indirectly and others autobiographically. François Truffaut’s 400 Blows (1959), Federico Fellini’s Amarcord (1974), and Ingmar Bergman’s Fanny & Alexander (1983) are well-known examples. Although James Gray’s Armageddon Time joins a more recent wave that includes Alfonso Cuarón’s Rome (2018), Kenneth Branagh’s Belfast (2021) and Steven Spielberg’s The Fabelmans (2022).
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This story of passage from childhood to adolescence has Paul Graff (Banks Repeta) as its central character, a boy who has a relatively quiet life in the suburbs of New York. Although he lacks nothing, his constant rebellious attitude causes him problems at school. More understandable is the rebellious attitude of his friend Johnny Davis (Jaylin Webb) discriminated against for being black. Both are good friends, although society does not value them equally. His mother Esther (Anne Hathaway) is the president of the parents’ association, something Paul believes is a position of power that backs him up.
“The Time of Armageddon” is a contemporary reflection of the transition to adolescence. (HBO Max)
In Paul’s family, mostly Jewish, there are several Holocaust survivors, but among all of them it is his grandfather, Aaron Rabinowitz (Anthony Hopkins) who is the moral reference point for the young man. His teachings are what matters most to Paul, almost always straying and lacking. When the world around him becomes more and more complicated, Grandpa will be the one to order his ideas and clearly explain the right path to take, even over the orders of Paul’s own father, Irving Graff (Jeremy Strong).
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The film plays more subtly than other titles of this style to portray the main character, but fails conclusively due to the limited charisma and irritating overacting of the main actor. Although this young man had shown greater elegance in, for example, The Black Telephone, here he makes it impossible for the viewer to feel empathy with him. It’s not that he portrays a boy at a difficult age that bothers him, but his unconvincing gestures and the mistaken feeling that he’s faking it all the time. Even surrounded by great actors, everything falls apart for him.
A friendship that defies the racial barriers of society. (HBO Max)
The more personal and nuanced details with which the film delays emotion are not such when it needs to emphasize many times that it hates the future president Ronald Reagan and describe, with even less subtlety, the private school where the Trump family stomps and shows his caste rank elevated above average. James Gray, a great director, seems to have a need for political discourse with names in a film that could express the same values without making those comments. Another point against for a film with several successes and moments of great beauty.
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