Al Pacino to play Joe Paterno in movie based on biography

Noted auteur Brian De Palma (2002's Femme Fatale) and famed thespian Al Pacino (2011's Jack and Jill) are teaming up to make Polk, a film detailing how James K. Polk, the 11th President of the United States, negotiated the purchase of Cuba from Spain in 1848.

No, I'm kidding. But this is true: De Palma and Pacino are combining to make a movie about former Penn State coach Joe Paterno titled Happy Valley, based on the book Paterno by Joe Posnanski. (Posnanski writes for Sports on Earth, a joint venture between MLB Advanced Media and USA TODAY Sports.)

Producer Edward Pressman (Wall Street, among others) issued a statement confirming the film's development:

"Happy Valley reunites the Scarface and Carlito's Way team of De Palma and Pacino for the third time and I can't think of a better duo to tell this story of a complex, intensely righteous man who was brought down by his own tragic flaw."

The film "is expected to detail Paterno's entire life rather than just its denouement," The Guardian reports.

In choosing Pacino, the producers of the film turned down the advice of The New York Times' literary critic Dwight Garner, who suggested in his review of Posnanski's book in August a… slightly different approach.

"You could suddenly imagine the comic actor Eugene Levy portraying him on screen as a lecherous dweeb, his trousers hiked up to his nipples," Garner wrote.

As an aside, the train-station scene in De Palma's The Untouchables is one of the great moments in movie history. (I am not an expert on this topic.)

See the resemblance? Photos: Getty Images, AP