Three TRUE Tales That'd Make Fantastic Films

'The Mystery of the Dyatlov Pass'

Dyatlov Pass is located in the Northern Ural Mountains, Russia. It’s in a remote region that gets few visitors, due to the extremely harsh conditions it experiences in the winter months, when temperatures can drop as low as forty degrees below zero. It’s a wasteland that hosts one of the strangest unsolved mysteries of the last fifty years.

In 1959, a group of nine experienced hikers and skiers arrived at the pass during a trek through the Urals. They were set to telegraph a message back to town midway through their trip, but after days with no word a rescue party was sent. What the party found in the Dyatlov Pass was a scene of unexplainable terror. Five of the hikers were found dead near their tents, dressed in nothing but their underwear and frozen from the icy cold. Another four bodies were found months later, buried beneath the snow. One was missing a tongue, and all showed signs of strange skull and chest fractures that could only have been caused by a force of great magnitude. Even stranger, all the bodies were found to have unusually high levels of radioactive contamination.

The still unsolved case of the incident at Dyatlov Pass might as well be a readymade premise for a horror/ thriller movie, as all it would take is an enterprising filmmaker and writer to fill in the details of just what really happened in the mountains that night. Reality is usually much creepier than fiction can ever hope to be.

'The Desert Fox'

Erwin Rommel is remembered as one of the greatest commanders on the German side during WWII. But what is often forgotten is that even though he was a hero of the Nazi Party, Rommel was also very much opposed to Hitler’s policies and eventually joined a secret plot to overthrow the German dictator.

Erwin Rommel was one of the great German heroes of WWI, and at the beginning of WWII he petitioned Hitler for control of an armoured tank division. Though he had no previous experience commanding mobile infantry, he soon distinguished himself on the battlefield in North Africa, where he became known for his bold style of advancing and attacking the enemy even when outnumbered. It was here that Rommel earned his nickname “the Desert Fox,” and he was eventually promoted to the rank of Field Marshal. Still, at the same time that he was a national hero, Rommel disagreed with many of Hitler’s policies. He was known to treat all prisoners humanely, and outright disobeyed Hitler’s orders that all Jews should be killed on sight. After returning to Europe at the end of the Africa campaign, Rommel became convinced that Hitler had to be stopped, and he joined a conspiracy to remove him from power. An assassination attempt failed, and Rommel’s involvement soon came to light. Rommel was ready to be arrested and stand trial, but after being convinced by two of Hitler’s Generals that the process would be painful for his family, he took his own life in 1944.

Like Patton, Rommel is well respected by military historians for his do-or-die attitude, but he was also reckless, and this is a quality that would make him an interesting character to portray in a film. There is also the unusual nature of the North Africa campaign, which relied heavily on tank combat, an inherently cinematic aspect of WWII that has yet to really be explored in the movies. Overall, though, the biggest draw to Rommel’s story is the redemptive aspect of it—that he eventually turned on Hitler and tried, in his words, “to come to the rescue of Germany.”

My choice of actor to play the ‘Desert Fox’, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel would be Michael Fassbender.

(http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-true-stories-movies.php)

'The Devil in the White City'

Holmes is notorious for being one of the first confirmed serial killers in the history of the United States. He was already considered a murderer when his home town of Chicago became the centre of the then biggest event on the planet. Offering his strangely surreal house (a labyrinthine, windowless ensnarement) as potential accommodations, Holmes lured tourists into his trap. He eventually confessed to killing 27 people, though police at the time put the count closer to 200. While there’s a decent documentary about the case, and several books, this story just screams for a solid Hollywood treatment. Erik Larson wrote The Devil in the White City about it, and it sold millions of copies. After its initial 2003 publication, Tom Cruise bought the rights with an eye on playing Holmes himself, but for whatever reason, things didn’t work out. The script went back up for auction and now a group headlined by Leonardo Dicaprio has purchased the script. According to Deadline, Dicaprio is definitely keeping the HH Holmes role for himself, and I am anticipating a masterpiece. For all of his glaring faults, HH Holmes was also a charmer. When he didn’t feel like murdering, he smooth talked his way into people’s hearts, collecting property and life insurance policies along the way. Leonardo Dicaprio’s career could benefit from a turn as an anti-hero, and HH Holmes may be the perfect savage for the job. Educated, handsome and ruthless, this role has potential Oscar nomination written all over it. I can’t wait. In the mean time, you should head over to Amazon and pick up The Devil in the White City. Something tells me after we get our first trailer, people are going to head to Barnes and Noble in droves.

(http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Leonardo-DiCaprio-To-Play-Serial-Killer-HH-Holmes-21499.html)

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