Will Smith and Antoine Fuqua's Runaway Slave Thriller EMANCIPATION Picked Up By Apple

A couple of weeks ago it was announced that Will Smith was teaming up with director Antoine Fuqua to develop a runaway slave thriller titled Emancipation. Well, after a bidding war between Apple, Warner Bros, MGM, Lionsgate and Universal Pictures, Apple won and landed the film.

The film is based on the true story of a man named Peter, a runaway slave, “who escaped to the Union Army during the Civil War and outwitted bounty hunters over 10 days through the Louisiana swamps, masking his scent with onions. Army photos taken of Peter showing the scars on his back from being whipped were published in 1863 and became known as the ‘scourged back’ photos, which became a means to illustrate the cruelty of slavery.”

Emancipation is written by William N. Collage and there’s no doubt that this is going to be a moving and powerful film. The film production is expected to start early in 2021.

Apple reportedly picked up the film for somewhere between $105 million and $120 million.

Source: Variety