It'll probably come as no surprise that a feature film centered on legendary, disgraced Penn State coach Joe Paterno is in the works. His fall from grace after the Joe Sandusky child abuse scandal broke is still a hot topic, evidenced by Joe Posnanski's book Paterno atop the best-seller list right now. According to Deadline, Posnanski's biography will form the basis of the movie, and the man to play Paterno none other than Al Pacino.
Paterno's story is a long and complicated one that ends in tragedy, especially if you were a Nittany Lions fan. A Brooklyn native, Paterno would pass up a career as a lawyer and begin working as an assistant coach for Penn State in 1950. He took over as head coach in 1966 and the rest was history, amassing a career record that ranked him #2 on the all-time list of wins. Then it was discovered that he helped cover up sexual molestation committed by his defensive coordinator, Joe Sandusky, and everything went to crap. Paterno was fired, and the NCAA stripped Penn State of a good deal of his victories. Sandusky was convicted on 45 counts of sexual abuse and is now in prison trading cigarettes for his life. Paterno died in January of complications from lung cancer. Not a happy tale at all.
Posnanski had been writing the book for months before the scandal broke, but when it did he made sure to include it, and it will be reflected in the film as well. Pacino's played head coaches before, such as in Oliver Stone's Any Given Sunday. And he knows his way around a controversial real life figure, such as when he took on Jack Kevorkian in You Don't Know Jack. I look at this as a something of a combination of the two, so Pacino should be perfect for it.
