Hillcoat to get feet wet with studio project ‘Wettest County in the World’

When John Hillcoat burst onto the scene with gruesome Western experience of The Proposition he not only made a name for himself, he gave many fans of the genre a reason to cheer. Something tells me that this project might just be custom fit for the Aussie filmmaker.

Columbia Pictures has preemptively purchased the rights to Matt Bondurant’s upcoming novel titled The Wettest
County in the World and have attached Hillcoat to direct and for Douglas Wick and Lucy Fisher to produce through prod co. Red Wagon.

Based on a true story, this revolves around a moonshine gang operating in the bootlegging capital of America — Franklin County, Va. — during Prohibition. The novel which will only be available in October, draws its roots from the author’s grandfather and two granduncles, who made up a fierce criminal gang at the center of the country’s moonshine trade. The three brothers were eventually killed in 1930 after they refused to join the illegal cartel set up by Commonwealth’s Attorney Carter Lee, grandnephew of Robert E. Lee. Carter Lee was subsequently tried for conspiracy.

Hillcoat is currently filming the Cormac McCarthy adpatation of The Road with a A-star list of actors in Viggo
Mortensen and Charlize
Theron and the underrated Guy Pearce.