Hollywood star Leonard DiCaprio’s production company is now the driving force bringing the story of the Volkswagen emissions scandal to the big screen, but it is, as yet, unclear whether or not the film will be a star vehicle for the five-time Oscar nominee, the Hollywood Reporter claims.
The actor’s company, Appian Way, has worked on The Wolf of Wall Street and Shutter Island, as well as the forthcoming feature The Revenant, an Oscar-bait role that sees DiCaprio star alongside Tom Hardy and Domhnall Gleeson as a frontiersman left for dead.
Now sources say that Appian Way has bought the movie rights to a book proposal made by Jack Ewing, that was recently picked up by the Norton publishing house in a six-figure deal. The company will produce a feature based on the book in collaboration with Paramount Studios, and the picture is expected to focus on how VW’s “more, better, faster” work ethic fuelled one of the most widespread and far-reaching corporate frauds ever committed.
The German motor firm has confirmed that at least 11m of its vehicles were fitted with an electronic device allowing the engine to cheat emission tests. After the story broke in the US last month, VW admitted that it had rigged 500,000 diesel cars to pass the strict environmental standards in test environments, but that the everyday emissions rates were up to 40 times higher on the open road.
Volkswagen’s new chief executive Matthias Müller last week said that the company hoped to have fixed all of the engines it had rigged by the end of 2016, and that the company, the world’s largest motoring firm, has set aside €6.5bn to meet the cost of recalling the vehicles.
The film based on the scandal is still in the earliest stages of development, meaning no writer, director, or even cast members are attached to the project. DiCaprio, seen as a perennial runner-up during awards season, is an advocate for environmental issues, and has recently signed a deal with Netflix to produce a number of environmental documentaries.
Volkswagen Ireland has launched a website for concerned Irish motorists to see if their vehicles are affected by the emissions scandal. For more information, please click here.
