Overview
- Paramount unveiled the first official trailer Wednesday for By Any Means, a 1960s‑set crime thriller led by Mark Wahlberg and Yahya Abdul‑Mateen II that the studio will release in U.S. theaters on September 4, 2026.
- The film dramatizes a real‑life, uneasy alliance between mafia enforcer Gregory Scarpa and FBI agent Wayne Strider as they probe killings of civil‑rights leaders and pursue Ku Klux Klan members in Mississippi.
- Elegance Bratton directs from a Sascha Penn screenplay, and the supporting cast includes Giancarlo Esposito as Vernon Dahmer plus Nicole Beharie, Josh Lucas, Ethan Embry, LisaGay Hamilton, LaChanze, and David Strathairn.
- Production leaders say Scarpa’s children served as advisors and Vernon Dahmer’s daughter was present for filming of her father’s sequence, and the studio reports unusually strong responses from test screenings.
- The film foregrounds real history—Scarpa’s mafia role and Dahmer’s 1966 death after a KKK firebombing—and its release could prompt renewed public discussion about how Hollywood portrays racial violence and institutional corruption.