Fox has set Milk Oscar winner Dustin Lance Black to write the screenplay for the studio’s film about now infamous 18-year-old outlaw Colton Harris-Moore, aka the Barefoot Bandit. David Gordon Green is in final talks to direct.
The deal comes just as Harris-Moore was transported in chains from Miami to Seatac, Washington, after his dramatic arrest in the Bahamas on July 11, says Variety.
Green is producing through his Rough House Pictures production shingle. Fox came aboard the project in April, while Harris-Moore was still on the lam. The picture is based on a Bob Friel book proposal, Taking Flight: The Hunt for a Young Outlaw.
The Barefoot Bandit has committed scores of crimes, mostly in the Pacific Northwest and Canada, including allegedly stealing at least five small aircraft, a boat and two cars, as well as burglarizing at least 100 private residences.
“It’s clear that there’s a reason the country has become so enamored with this story, and that is worthy of investigation,” Black said. “Like any great outlaw story, it speaks to the social and political mood of a generation.”
Harris-Moore has a massive Facebook following, and has been compared to Frank Abagnale Jr., the young outlaw that Leonardo DiCaprio portrayed in Steven Spielberg’s Catch Me If You Can.
