Deadline is reporting that Paul Greengrass, best known for his work taking the Bourne series to new heights after a so-so first film, is in talks to helm a movie that Leonardo DiCaprio and Jonah Hill have been looking to make for a while now. I reported several months ago that DiCaprio and Hill, fresh off their well-received onscreen pairing in The Wolf of Wall Street, were looking to work together again and had chosen the real-life story of disgraced security guard Richard Jewell as their next project. 

The film will be based on an article from Vanity Fair called The Ballad of Richard Jewell and tells the sickening story of how Jewell, a security guard that helped quell a terrorist attack at the 1996 Olympic games in Atlanta, was turned into a prime suspect and object of ridicule by the news media despite being innocent. What happened to Jewell would foreshadow what’s so very common nowadays: 24/7 news networks beating a story to death and trying to turn the most salacious stories into must-see TV, even without the apparent luxury of accurate intelligence or the actual facts surrounding a case.

Hill would play Jewell, and DiCaprio would play the southern attorney that helped him get through this dark period- despite having never dealt with anything quite like this.

Director Greengrass has shown a keen interest on telling real human stories, and a project of this nature seems right up his alley. Anyone who’s seen his work on films such as the 9/11 drama United 93, or last year’s riveting Captain Phillips, knows the director has an eye for bringing recent history to the big screen in captivating ways. Adding further credibility to the report is that Phillips screenwriter, Billy Ray, has been tapped to write the script.

Seems like a good lineup of talent for this film, and this could definitely be a movie to keep an eye out for. 

SOURCE: Deadline