By Ray Pride Pride@moviecitynews.com

Michael Mann Returns To TV For “Hue 68” Vietnam Mini From Author Of “Blackhawk Down”

Posted Monday, April 24th, 2017 - Comments Off on Michael Mann Returns To TV For “Hue 68” Vietnam Mini From Author Of “Blackhawk Down”
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[PR] ACADEMY AWARD®-NOMINATED FILMMAKERS MICHAEL MANN & MICHAEL DE LUCA ACQUIRE RIGHTS TO MARK BOWDEN’S HUE 1968

 Bestselling Author Mark Bowden’s Highly Anticipated New Book HUE 1968  Will Be Released by Grove Atlantic on June 6

Academy Award-nominated filmmakers Michael Mann and Michael De Luca have acquired the rights to Mark Bowden’s highly-anticipated new book, Hue 1968. A remarkable achievement by Bowden, Hue 1968 is an extraordinary kaleidoscopic work from personal accounts on all sides during the Tet Offensive, which was the turning point of American involvement in the Vietnam War. As the bestselling author of Black Hawk Down, Mark Bowden’s upcoming book, five years in the writing, is his most ambitious work yet. The book will be published by Grove Atlantic June 6. In nabbing the rights to Hue 1968, Mann and De Luca envision releasing the ambitious project as an eight-to-ten-hour miniseries.

Huế, the cultural and historical capital, was the centerpiece of Hanoi’s 1968 Tet Offensive in which Hanoi sought to win the war in one stroke. Part military action and popular uprising, NVA infantry crossed mountains, completely undetected, to the outskirts of Huế while VC cadre infiltrated weapons and ordinance into the city. On January 31 at 2:30am they launched a surprise attack, overrunning the city except for two small military outposts.

“Mark Bowden’s written a masterpiece of intensely dramatic nonfiction,” said Mann.

The series will tell its story, as does the book, by experiencing the drama of Hue personally, intimately through the people on all sides of the conflict. Bowden’s kaleidoscopic storytelling through individual lives – contained under high-pressure in one place within 26 days in 1968 – is unlike anything else in recent non-fiction. A seemingly innocent schoolgirl on a bike in her white ao dai, turned hardened revolutionary when her sister was executed and she was tortured, pedals into Huế. Jim Coolican, a Marine captain from Carbondale, Pennsylvania – who’ll become a war hero – cannot convince his superiors Huế has been overrun by conventional infantry because that’s not supposed to be possible. An NVA infantryman, crossing mountain ranges in sandals, is a math teacher in a Hanoi middle school.  LBJ in his pajamas wakes up Westmoreland, whom he had sleepover…

“Bowden’s achievement is in making “them” into us,” said Mann. “We are them. There are no background people; people abstracted into statistics, body counts. There is the sense that everybody is somebody, as each is in the reality of his or her own life. The brilliance of Bowden’s narrative, the achievement of interviewing hundreds of people on all sides and making their human stories his foundation, is why Huế, 1968 rises to the emotional power and universality of For Whom The Bell Tolls and All Quiet on the Western Front.”

Mann will direct multiple episodes and will produce alongside Michael De Luca. Johnny Pariseau with help oversee the project for De Luca Productions, as will Justine Suzanne Jones for Forward Pass, Inc.

Michael De Luca is a three-time Academy Award nominated producer, for The Social Network, Moneyball and Captain Phillips. He recently produced the hit sequel Fifty Shades Darker, and also produced the 89th Academy Awards® this year with Jennifer Todd. His upcoming projects include the feature film version of the popular sci-fi franchise Battlestar Galactica at Universal; David Robert Mitchell’s Under The Silver Lakeat A24, starring Andrew Garfield; and a Barry Jenkins-penned script about the true life story of Claressa ‘T-Rex’ Shields who became the first American woman to win an Olympic gold medal in boxing.

Director, producer, and screenwriter Michael Mann has received four Academy Award nominations and four Emmy nominations, including two wins.  Mann’s work includes Thief, The Last Of The Mohicans,Collateral, Ali, The Insider, Heat, Miami Vice, and Public Enemies among others. Upcoming projects include Ferrari, starring Hugh Jackman and Noomi Rapace about Enzo Ferrari in 1957. In addition, Mann, in conjunction with HarperCollins, has recently launched Michael Mann Books.

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