PAPER TIGER Trailer Throws Adam Driver and Miles Teller Into a Deadly Russian Mafia Scheme
One bad plan, two brothers, and the Russian mafia breathing down their necks. That’s the dangerous situation Adam Driver and Miles Teller find themselves facing in the first trailer for Paper Tiger, filmmaker James Gray’s new crime drama set on the streets of 1980s New York City.
Set in 1986, Paper Tiger follows brothers Gary (Driver) and Isaac (Teller), two men chasing their own versions of the American Dream. Gary is a former cop, while Isaac works as an engineer and has a family of his own. Unfortunately, Gary gets them mixed up in a scheme that spirals into something much more dangerous when the Russian mafia enters the picture.
What begins as an opportunity threatens everything the brothers have built. Their relationship starts coming apart, their future becomes increasingly uncertain, and their entire family is placed in serious danger. Johansson plays Isaac’s wife, who is dealing with turmoil of her own as the situation closes in around them.
Neon has released the trailer for the film following its world premiere in competition at the Cannes Film Festival, where it walked away with a pretty enthusiastic response. The movie also stars Scarlett Johansson and is now headed into awards season with a November 13 limited theatrical release.
The film has also been selected to open the New York Film Festival at the end of September, which feels like the perfect homecoming for Gray’s Queens-set family crime story.
There’s also a personal connection between Gray and the material. The writer-director has said Paper Tiger was loosely inspired by his own family’s encounter with the Russian mafia in New York City during the 1980s.
That real-world foundation should give the crime story some extra weight, especially with Gray focusing as much on the family caught in the middle as the criminal world surrounding them.
The filmmaker certainly has the right cast to pull that off. Driver, Teller, and Johansson are all actors capable of digging into complicated characters, and the early response out of Cannes suggests Gray gave them plenty to work with.
Paper Tiger received a 10-minute standing ovation following its premiere at the festival. Neon acquired the movie shortly before Cannes, where it was added as a late entry to the 2026 Competition lineup.
Gray has built much of his career around messy families, ambition, loyalty, desperation, and characters trying to find their place in unforgiving environments. Taking those ideas into a 1986 Queens crime story involving two brothers and the Russian mafia sounds like territory perfectly suited to him.
Add Driver as an ex-cop whose questionable decision puts his family in the crosshairs, Teller as the brother dragged into the mess, and Johansson caught in the fallout, and Paper Tiger has the ingredients for an intense family drama wrapped inside a gritty New York crime movie.
Paper Tiger opens the New York Film Festival in late September before Neon gives the film a limited theatrical release on November 13.