With the hit first season of "True Detective" behind him, director Cary Fukunaga can pretty much write his own ticket, but even before helming all eight episodes of the Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson anthology series, the guy had project after project in development, including a two-part adaptation of Stephen King's "It" for Warner Bros.
Fukunaga has always been an insanely busy guy. He is currently working on "Beasts of No Nation" with Idris Elba, and it looks like another project is moving foward as well. Back in August, DreamWorks bought the rights to a book proposal called "Noble Assassin" about the life of Robert de La Rochefoucauld, a key member of the French Resistance during World War II, and now that film has a writer, Scott Silver ("The Fighter").
If you haven't heard of de La Rochefoucauld, you should know that he may be one of the most badass figures of the Second World War. His many acts of bravery while working as a saboteur against the Nazis make his Wikipedia page read like a spy thriller. It's actually kind of amazing that his exploits haven't made their way to the big screen yet, but if anyone can tell this story, it's Fukunaga.
Here's what you should know about Robert de La Rochefoucauld.
He was a spy prodigy.
After the German invasion, de La Rouchefoucald was identified as a supporter of Charles de Gaulle at the age of 18 — and therefore a target for the Nazis. He eventually fled to Spain, but was thrown into a prison camp, where he applied a fake English accent good enough to pass for a Brit. He was later evacuated to the UK, where he took up with the Churchill's Special Operations Executive, England's clandestine force during the war.
He actually did the kind of things you only see in movies.
De La Rouchefoucauld's many missions into occupied France have become legend in the decades since World War II, but even with just a quick overview of his exploits, it's easy to understand why. One of his biggest sabotage missions involved smuggling 40 kilos of explosives into a German munitions factory using hollowed-out loaves of bread. After every successful mission and extraction, he would return to enemy territory, putting his life back on the line.
He was pretty much impossible to kill.
The Germans captured de La Rouchefoucauld and sentenced him to death on at least three occasions, and he escaped every time. But this being de La Rouchefoucauld, he didn't just get away; he did so spectacularly.
After his first death sentence, he hopped out of the back of a truck, dodged bullets and stole a Nazi limo. The second time, he faked a seizure, killed the guard, stole his uniform and then borrowed a nun's habit to disguise himself. The final time, de La Rouchefoucauld made it as far as the field in which the Nazis meant to kill him by firing squad, but the French Resistance showed up, allowing him to slip away. He, of course, survived the war and died at the age of 88 in 2012.
So here's to hoping that Fukunaga does make "Noble Assassin," if only because it would be a crime to never turn de La Rouchefoucauld's life into a film. But also because just thinking about the hypothetical final product makes me feel like it's already my favorite movie.
via MTV News
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