New York, circa 1970s, is a familiar place to most moviegoers. Many great American films were shot on the real streets of it's five boroughs, and it is constantly being recreated for biopics, auto-fictions and crime fantasies—Paper Tiger is all three.

Irwin (Miles Teller) and Hester (Scarlett Johansson) are living in Brooklyn with their two teenage sons, struggling but managing to keep food on the table in the face of New York's burgeoning financial collapse. Then, Irwin's charismatic gorilla of a brother, Gary (Adam Driver), re-enters their lives with a business opportunity for Irwin. Gary was a career cop who retired a few years before we meet our characters in Paper Tiger's mellow opening scenes. Gary defined himself and his pride on staying clean while he was in the force, and despite this he believes that the armies of the NYPD would march at his beck and call on any occasion. He is clearly respected by his former peers, as he's invited to ceremonies and asked to present awards to his mentors upon their retirement, but Gary's ego is his blind side. He has no idea who he can really trust. On the surface, Gary is a successful man, he's become a security consultant in his middle age. He can afford a nice car, nice suits, a nice haircut, but he's ostracized his family to pursue it. Feeling the belt tighten as the city's economy takes blow after blow, Gary is looking for some cheap, easy money to stash away for a comfortable life, and he wants Irwin to be a part of that.

Gary brings Irwin in on a consulting gig for some Russians who are running an oil refractory near Brighton Beach, promising Irwin this will be the start of a new business that they'll own together. Gary will use his charm and status to get them in the door, and Irwin will use his brain power to provide genuinely good services. At least, that's what Irwin thinks this arrangement is. The reality of the situation is that Gary's looking to get in on some mob money. The Russians are moving into New York, soon to take a dominant foothold in the cities unions and organized crime, pushing out the Italians and Jews from these shadowed inner circles. Gary knows this, but plays dumb. Irwin doesn't, and acts dumb. Innocently, trying to do his new job, Irwin goes to one of the refractories at the Gowanus Canal at night and sees some dumping that he shouldn't have seen—after all, he's advising them on better, environmentally-conscious practices. This gives the Russian's the power they need over Gary to turn him into a tool in their kit, at least they hope, and so they begin to put the heat on Irwin until Gary breaks and comes into their fold.

If in summary it seems that Driver's gregarious ex-cop is the center of the story, that's because it feels like he is. Although the film seems to insist that Irwin and Hester are the center of the drama, nothing in their stories can come close to Gary's fleeting moments. His is the more interesting, more dramatically juiced arc. Hester spends the runtime in another film, one where she is faced with her mortality and suffering in silence. Irwin is our way into this story, but spends most of the movie scared and backed into a corner. When Gary's backed into a corner, he uses his sideways smile to talk himself out of trouble, or if that fails, the end of his belt to whip his enemies into submission. When Irwin finds himself in that same corner, he asks Gary for help. The characterization is lacking, and the film suffers for it.

The Russian mobsters of Paper Tiger are another issue the film never finds a solution for. They're written generically, always menacing, and played by unfamiliar actors that don't bring anything of note to their parts. So, while the film is well crafted with cinematography by Joaquín Baca-Asay (Two Lovers) and music by Christopher Spelman (We Own the Night, Armageddon Time), those strong technical facets and the confident direction from Gray are just not enough to bring this film up to the tier it wants to be. By the time the credits roll, the only memorable part of the film are the committed, naturalistic performances from it's three lead actors.

However, no review of Paper Tiger would be complete without mentioning its climactic tall-grass shootout sequence. See the movie for this scene, and you won't regret it.

★★★

Kenna Wong Ghaill