‘Torso’ Graphic Novel To Get Movie Treatment, David Lowery Attached

A Torso graphic novel movie treatment could soon be coming to the big screen with David Lowery on board to adapt, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

On Wednesday, the entertainment website noted that Lowery had signed on to write and direct the thriller, which itself is based on a real-life string of Cleveland homicides investigated by Elliot Ness.

In the real story, there were 12 murders and the killer was never identified, though readers of the graphic novel by Brian Michael Bendis and Marc Andreyko know the comic takes a different course.

What fact and fiction share in common, however, is the gruesome nature of the crimes. From September 1935 through August 1938, the victims were found in pieces with only two of the 12 identified.

The rest were John Does and Jane Does. In many cases, the police only had a torso or assorted body parts to use for identification. Ness, then the city’s director of public safety, vowed to catch the killer, but history had other ideas.

The Cleveland Police Museum website has a full rundown of the case, known as the Kingsbury Run Murders, for the impoverished shantytown on which the killer preyed.

THR noted that David Fincher and Matt Damon were once signed to direct and star, respectively. With Fincher attached, the film would have been a much higher profile affair.

Lowery, however, has forged a name for himself on the indie scene with this year’s Sundance Film Festival hit Ain’t Them Bodies Saints and an upcoming collaboration with Robert Redford in The Old Man and the Gun, and early word is he plans to keep this a small, intimate affair.

Lowery’s affinity for period pieces should make him a great fit for the Torso graphic novel movie adaptation, and his handling of stars Casey Affleck and Rooney Mara prove he’s gritty enough to manage a high-profile cast. Here’s a bit on Saints:

Don’t let the director fool you, though. He’s got a softer side, or at least Disney seems to think so since they’ve also tapped him to write their in-development Pete’s Dragon remake.

Do you think David Lowery is the right fit for the Torso graphic novel movie? Have you checked out the source material from Bendis and Andreyko?

[Image via Flickr Creative Commons]