Universal Pictures has acquired the movie rights to Laura Hillenbrand's book Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption. Deadline.com reported that Universal "is in talks with Francis Lawrence [Water for Elephants] to direct, and wants Crazy Heart helmer Scott Cooper to write the script.... The studio that rode Hillenbrand's book Seabiscuit into the winner's circle as a film now hopes she'll work the same magic on the story of the unbreakable spirit of Louis Zamperini, a former Olympic track prodigy who endured unimaginable hardship as a WWII POW."
Universal had purchased Zamperini's "life rights way back in 1957 along with his memoir, Devil at My Heels. Tony Curtis wanted to play him, expecting a script to be ready after he returned from shooting Spartacus for director Stanley Kubrick. The project stalled, though, and remained dormant until 1998. After CBS broadcast a moving segment during its broadcast of the Nagano Olympics where Zamperini carried the Olympic torch, Nicolas Cage wanted to play Zamperini. His Brillstein-Grey managers got the project going with Antoine Fuqua, and a Robert Schenkkan script rewritten by Neil Tolkin. Titled Iron Man and later Zamperini, the drama once again languished," Deadline.com wrote.