SIX BILLION DOLLAR MAN Gets Oscar-Nominated Filmmaker as Writer

Damian Szifron, the filmmaker who nabbed a best foreign-language film Oscar nomination for Wild Tales, has been tapped to pen the screenplay for Six Billion Dollar Man.

Mark Wahlberg is attached to star in and Pete Berg attached to direct the updated version of the The Six Million Dollar Man, the 1970s TV series which in turn was based on the Martin Caidin novel Cyborg.

Billion Dollar Man again focuses on Steve Austin, this time a military officer instead of a test pilot, as he was in the TV series, who suffers a horrible accident only to be saved by cutting-edge technology. This technology makes him half machine and gives him incredible strength and speed.

“The themes surrounding this beloved property allow for the creation of a memorable sci-fi actioner as well as a bold spy thriller,” said Szifron in a statement. “Expectations are high and I’ll do my best to deliver the strongest basis for an amazing cinematic experience.”

Szifron is an Argentinean filmmaker who wrote and directed last year’s Wild Tales, an anthology that told six dramatic stories. It received a best foreign-language film Oscar nomination while sweeping Argentina’s version of the Academy Awards, netting 10 wins out of 21 total nominations.

Source: THR

THE SIX BILLION DOLLAR MAN: Mark Wahlberg Says SIX BILLION DOLLAR MAN Is A "Superhero" Movie

Last month, is was reported that Wahlberg would team up with his Lone Survivor director Peter Berg (“Hancock”) for a film adaptation of the 1970s television series The Six Million Dollar Man, aka The Bionic Man, which starred Lee Majors (“The Fall Guy”).

While promoting his new movie The Gambler, Mark Wahlberg chatted with the entertainment website, Collider, about his upcoming film project The Six Billion Dollar Man. Though, he won’t get to it until he has finished Deep Water Horizon.

Wahlberg briefly spoke of the project with Collider:

Any plans for you to be a superhero in the future?
WAHLBERG:  We’re talking about doing Six Billion Dollar Man, which is very much a superhero, but I don’t have to wear any kind of spandex cape.  So that would be cool.  Howard Gordon is writing the script and people are talking about doing it, but we got a great, great idea and it’s something that’s been in the pipeline for quite some time, so hopefully if we get the script right maybe we’ll make it after we do the Deep Water Horizon.