The life of Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar holds a special intrigue to Hollywood and that is why they are creating another biopic about him, and this time, the movie about his life will star real-life couple Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz.
The film, which will simply be called Escobar will be taking on the memoir written by Virginia Vallejo back in 2008 entitled Loving Pablo, Hating Escobar. Fernando Leon de Aranoa will be writing the script and directing the movie.
Meanwhile, Bardem will be playing the titular character and follow his exploits in the Medellin and Cali cartels, where he dealt with dictators and made his cocaine industry flourish. Cruz, on the other hand, will be playing Vallejo, who had a relationship with the drug lord and later testified against him during a 2008 investigation into the 1985 Palace of Justice siege, which claimed the lives of at least 100 individuals.
The film is backed by Luc Besson's EuropaCorp and the rights for the film will be on sale at the Cannes film market, reported Empire Online.
Bardem will next be seen in Sean Penn's latest directorial effort called The Last Face, and he will also be seen as Captain Salazar in Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, which has been scheduled for release on July 7, 2017.
Cruz will next be seen in Julio Medem's Ma Ma and she also has a role in Ben Stiller's highly anticipated comedy movie Zoolander 2, which also stars Owen Wilson. The latter has been given a February 12, 2016 release date. Moreover, Cruz will also appear in Grimsby, scheduled on March 4, 2016
The infamous Escobar is known as "The King of Cocaine" and has even had a short stint in Colombian politics back in 1983. He is widely regarded as the wealthiest criminal in history, since he had an estimated net worth of $30 billion by the early 1990s.
His life has inspired several films and television series, including The Infiltrator, Escobar: Paradise Lost, Blow, Clear and Present Danger, Pablo: Angel o Demonio, Killing Pablo, Pablo Escobar: El Patrón del Mal, Tres Caínes, and El Patron, among many others.
Escobar's drug reign finally ended on December 2, 1993, when he and his bodyguard Alvaro de Jesus Agudelo, also known as El Limon attempted to flee from the Colombian National Police led by Brigadier Hugo Martinez. While they tried to escape by running across the roofs of adjoining houses in a middle-class barrio in Medellin, he sustained gun shots on his leg, torso, and the fatal one in his ear.
