In theaters today, By Any Means is a high-octane thriller with roots in a real historical story. After civil rights attorney Vernon Dahmer is murdered in Mississippi in the 1960s, a black FBI agent (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II’s Special FBI Agent Wayne Strider) is sent to investigate. Given the time and the place, he runs into some roadblocks, which leads him to seek the help of a mafia hitman turned FBI informant (Mark Wahlberg’s Gregory Scarpa) in order to figure out what’s going on. The film not only offers a true story not told on the big screen before, but something of a new take on the buddy cop movie, with plenty of intense action too.
Speaking with ComicBook ahead of the film’s release, By Any Means‘ director Elegance Bratton opened up about his influence on the film and how he wanted to balance the tones of being an action thriller, but also how you can explore the minds of characters in these scenarios. “I initially read the script and I really thought of the work of John Woo, particularly Hong Kong cinema, the notion that violence can be emotional,” Bratton revealed. “And I love the work of Martin Scorsese, criminal psychology, and Quentin Tarantino, his tension and volatility within his work.”
He continued, “As I was kind of, you know, excavating this material and thinking about it, it was really important to me to make a movie that moves, that is muscular and kinetic, and pays tribute to the camaraderie that these two characters form as the story is told.”
Bratton noted that reading the original script was powerful for him, saying that “it grabbed me by the throat, took me on a journey, asked no questions, took no prisoners, made no apologies.” For the filmmaker, it was all on the page, and it convinced him that he could make a movie that would entertain audiences and then make them go look at the real history.
“The only reason this movie exists is because of Vernon Dahmer. He’s the moral center of our film,” Bratton added. “And in 1966, he was murdered by the Klan for defending democracy, trying to exercise the Voting Rights Act, the very same Voting Rights Act that was just dismantled. So when it comes down to it, it’s really about honoring that legacy first and building the story through that lens of honoring that legacy.”
By Any Means is now playing in theaters.
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