After his excellent debut Amores Perros, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu has been a slight downward spiral with each new project. I’m not talking a M. Night Shyamalan-level descent, but each new film has found lesser levels of success with his Javier Bardem-starring Biutiful barely making an impact, even with two top Oscar nominations. Regardless, as a big fan of the director I look forward to anything he does next and tonight, we have an idea of what that may be.
Variety reports that Inarritu has climbed aboard a new drama based on Jennifer Vogel’s Flim-Flam Man: The True Story of My Father’s Counterfeit Life, with New Regency set to finance the film. Following the true story of Vogel’s father experiences in the criminal underworld, this film is set to shoot before his other planned film The Revenant, which has Sean Penn and Leonardo DiCaprio attached.
Fair Game writer Jez Butterworth scripted the currently untitled film, which sounds like more of an entertaining project than Inarritu’s somber previous work. This could be just the kind of change he needs. Check out a full synopsis from Amazon below.
A frank and intimate portrait of a charismatic, larger-than-life underworld figure, as told by the daughter who nearly followed in his footsteps.
“Do unto others before they do unto you,” John Vogel used to advise his daughter, Jennifer. By his account, the world was a crooked place and one had to be crooked in order to survive. A lifelong criminal, John robbed banks, burned down buildings, scammed investors, plotted murder, and single-handedly counterfeited more than $20 million. He also wrote a novel, invented a “jean stretcher,” baked lemon meringue pies, and arranged for ten-year-old Jennifer to see Rocky in an empty theater on Christmas Eve. In his reckless pursuit of the American Dream, he could be genuinely good. When it came time to pass his phony bills, he targeted Wal-Mart for political reasons.
In 1995, following John’s arrest in what turned out to be the fourth-largest seizure of counterfeit bills in U.S. history, he managed to slip away, leaving his now grown daughter to wonder what had become of him. Framed around the six months Jennifer’s father ran from the law, Flim-Flam Man vividly chronicles the police chase — stakeouts, lie detector tests, even a segment on Unsolved Mysteries. In describing her tumultuous life with John Vogel, Jennifer deftly examines the messy, painful, and almost inescapable inheritance one generation bequeaths to the next.
What do you think about this being Inarritu’s next film?