Leonardo DiCaprio has a problem most actors would kill to have — a plethora of potential projects to choose from. To say that the actor is in demand is an understatement, but needless to say, over the past little while he’s seen his name linked to a number of films including: a Martin Scorsese directed remake of “The Gambler“; Todd Field‘s Mexican revolution project “Creed Of Violence“; the financial world drama “The Wolf Of Wall Street“; the JFK assassination pic “Legacy Of Secrecy” and the true story serial killer tale “The Devil In The White City.” And this is all stuff that happened in the past twelve months. Well, Leo can add one more to his plate of options as Deadline reports Warner Bros. has acquired Don Winslow‘s “Satori” with DiCaprio to produce and star.
Shane Salerno will team with Winslow to write the script, in the story that follows Nicholai Hel, an assassin raised in Japan, who is a martial arts expert and enthusiast of the game Go. When his master faces charges of war crimes, Nicholai kills him “as an act of devotion” but gets thrown in jail because, well, he murdered him. The CIA bails him out and teams him up with a beautiful French woman who trains him to assassinate the Russian commissioner to China. But shit goes pear-shaped, and suddenly Nicholai is on the run through 1950s Vietnam hiding out from everybody ranging from worldwide intelligence agencies, the Corsican mob and a Vietnamese criminal syndicate. Assassinatin’ ain’t easy.
All remarks aside, this does seem like a pretty nifty little tale and it’s actually not the the first time DiCaprio sniffed around a Winslow book adapted by Salerno. The actor met with Oliver Stone for one of the male leads in “Savages” — based on a Winslow novel, penned by Salerno — and while that didn’t pan out, it’s clear he likes the author’s style. But when will this happen? Who fucking knows.
DiCaprio is pretty much busy through the spring of 2012 as he’s currently lensing “The Great Gatsby” with Baz Luhrmann and will move right over to Quentin Tarantino‘s “Django Unchained” after that. And then by time those two films are done, he’ll probably be attached to another half dozen projects. Like any A-list actor, he’ll likely wait to see where the script is at, who can direct, etc before making any decisions. And it also should be noted, DiCaprio is also on a longlist of actors to replace George Clooney in Steven Soderbergh‘s “The Man From U.N.C.L.E.” which is also set up at WB. So while “Satori” isn’t happening right away, it’ll be one to keep an eye on. DiCaprio will next be seen in Clint Eastwood‘s “J. Edgar” arriving this fall.
