A little more than a month ago, it was reported that Martin Scorsese, once again, found himself with a budgetary problem. Coming off the very expensive film, “The Irishman,” the filmmaker is now preparing to begin production on his next period drama, “Killers of the Flower Moon,” and Scorsese is asking for a lot of money to make that film a reality. Too much money for Paramount to be willing to fork over, in fact. This led the filmmaker to look at a potential streaming destination for the film, as we all know that Netflix, Apple, and others are more than happy to spend money on projects.
Well, according to Deadline, it appears that Scorsese has found a partner that is willing to pay for the cost of “Killers of the Flower Moon”—Apple TV+. The report claims that Apple is about to sign a deal that would allow the tech company to co-finance the new feature alongside Paramount, allowing for ‘Flower Moon’ to receive a reported $180 million (other reports have it closer to $150 million) to bring Scorsese’s new film to theaters. And yes, the film is going to have a full theatrical release, thanks to Paramount, before it ends up on Apple TV+. So, unlike his Netflix deal for “The Irishman,” the director has guaranteed that his latest film will be seen by whoever wants to see it on the big screen before being shuffled off to its streaming fate.
For those not familiar with the project, “Killers of the Flower Moon” tells the story of a string of murders on the land of the Osage Native Americans in Oklahoma in the 1920s. The case became the basis for the formation of the FBI. The film is set to star Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro, both well-known Scorsese film veterans.
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The report claims that, despite its incredibly high price tag, when Paramount allowed Scorsese to shop the movie around to other studios, everyone was interested in coming aboard, including Universal, MGM, Netflix, and, of course, Apple. There’s no word on when the film might be released, as production on ‘Flower Moon’ has not received an official start date.
