Joe Carnahan has been trickling out information about his next picture, Killing Pablo, a little at a time. Some people think the tight lipped approach has to do with the fact that there are two biopics out there in development about Pablo Escobar. Frequenters to Carnahan’s blog, however, know the director has gotten burned a few times by revealing information that wasn’t finalized. The result is that when Carnahan posts something, he’s pretty darn confident it will come to fruition.
Recently, Carnahan has been working on research for Killing Pablo and scouting out filming locations. His latest post reveals some really good information for the movie – there’s a good chance the production will film in the same locations Pablo terrorized, in Colombia, something Carnahan is excited about:
“Forget that with the ?budget we have, we will get more bang for our buck there...it also stamps ?and authenticates it in ways that Mexico or Buenos Aires ?never could. I want real Colombians in this film. I want to really stand? in the streets where Pablo was detonating bombs week after week. You? can't replace that gravitas that brings and there's not a production designer on the? planet (sorry Martin!) that can sufficiently recreate what is endemic to ?that country.”
As much as I like Antoine Fuqua (who is directing the rival picture), I’m hoping Carnahan produces a superior picture. He’s already got a leg up with the cast (Christian Bale and Javier Bardem) and the fact that he’s filming on location is incredibly exciting. Here’s hoping we’ll get more updates as Killing Pablo gets closer to filming.
