It is so nice to read that Robert De Niro isn’t making another Focker film, but instead making quality features. He is currently working on Righteous Kill for Jon Avnet and now we learn he is going to be teaming up with Heat director Michael Mann for Frankie Machine over at Paramount Pictures.
The film is an adaptation of the Don Winslow novel “The Winter of Frankie Machine” in which De Niro will play Frank Machianno, a mob hitman who has retired to run a bait shop. He agrees to help the son of a mob boss resolve a dispute with another Mafioso but is forced to turn into Frankie Machine again when he realizes he’s been set up to be killed.
Brian Koppelman and David Levien penned a draft of the screenplay and Alex Tse has just been set to do a major overhaul of the concept under Mann’s supervision.
Back in June the rumor was that De Niro was going to make the film with Martin Scorsese, but the Variety article makes no mention of those rumors.
