Screen Talks
Screen Talk: James Gray
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A discussion of great New York City filmmakers wouldn’t be complete without mention of James Gray, who has done much to explore the city’s underbelly. A native of Queens who graduated from USC’s School of Cinematic Arts, his emergence as a filmmaker coincided with an explosion of independent-minded directors in the 1990s. His feature debut, the low-key, Brighton Beach-set crime drama Little Odessa, was completed when he was just 25, and won the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival. He followed it with The Yards and We Own the Night, both starring Mark Wahlberg and Joachin Phoenix, which explored the moral ambiguity that lies on the thin line between law and disorder. The romantic drama Two Lovers, an adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s short story White Nights, saw the filmmaker shift in tone and genre, which hinted at the marked and assured change in direction he would subsequently take with the richly evocative period drama The Immigrants, the true-story adventure yarn The Lost City of Z and the sci-fi epic Ad Astra.
Armageddon Time saw James Gray return to New York, but this time closer to home with a semi-autobiographical account of his youth. His latest, Paper Tiger, once again sees him explore New York’s underworld and is a thrilling example of a master filmmaker at his peak. We are delighted that he will join us for this Screen Talk.
A discussion of great New York City filmmakers wouldn’t be complete without mention of James Gray, who has done much to explore the city’s underbelly. A native of Queens who graduated from USC’s School of Cinematic Arts, his emergence as a filmmaker coincided with an explosion of independent-minded directors in the 1990s. His feature debut, the low-key, Brighton Beach-set crime drama Little Odessa, was completed when he was just 25, and won the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival. He followed it with The Yards and We Own the Night, both starring Mark Wahlberg and Joachin Phoenix, which explored the moral ambiguity that lies on the thin line between law and disorder. The romantic drama Two Lovers, an adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s short story White Nights, saw the filmmaker shift in tone and genre, which hinted at the marked and assured change in direction he would subsequently take with the richly evocative period drama The Immigrants, the true-story adventure yarn The Lost City of Z and the sci-fi epic Ad Astra.
Armageddon Time saw James Gray return to New York, but this time closer to home with a semi-autobiographical account of his youth. His latest, Paper Tiger, once again sees him explore New York’s underworld and is a thrilling example of a master filmmaker at his peak. We are delighted that he will join us for this Screen Talk.