Al Pacino Reportedly Set to Play Joe Paterno in Possible Penn State Movie

A movie that simply doesn't need to be made is being shopped at the moment and has Al Pacino playing the role of Joe Paterno. 

Mike Fleming of (h/t Larry Brown Sports) Deadline New York reports the Hollywood legend would play the role of the Penn State icon who was fired from his station as head coach shortly before his death. 

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ICM Partners next week will be taking a package for a movie about former Penn State football head coach Joe Paterno, with Al Pacino attached to play the man called JoePa by most students at Happy Valley. The package will be build around Joe Posnanski’s biography Paterno, which is now atop The New York Times Bestseller List in its second week. Pacino’s manager, Rick Nicita, will produce.

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It's important to note this is in the shopping phase and no movie is imminent.

However, Fleming notes there is a great deal of optimism that this very movie will come to fruition, noting, "I don’t often write about projects before they’re set up, but I doubt this one will stay on the market for long."

Too soon?

Yes, in my estimation this is far too soon to bring the glitz and glamor of Hollywood to a story that is still very much a gaping wound to millions.  

Fleming gives the plot of the story which is as you would imagine, weaves Posnanski's book into a story moviegoers will clamor for. 

It will center on Joe Paterno as a leader who, "builds a powerhouse football program that turns him into a campus deity."

The rest has already been recorded in the hours of live coverage we have all been witness to these many months, and the countless words we have read on the topic. 

Jerry Sandusky is imprisoned for heinous crimes against children and Joe Paterno's legacy has been destroyed. 

Any made-from-reality movie is meant to bring back the emotion of the true events and the reality of those affected. 

It doesn't get any more emotional than what we already feel. 

Perhaps someday this tale could be unearthed and done justice on the big screen, but that time is not now. It's best to let this sordid affair die and allow those affected to heal before movie tickets are purchased to go see it on the big screen. 

Would Al Pacino make a good Paterno?

These are the kinds of questions that are simply too ridiculous to answer at this point, but the kind that we see already popping up in comment sections around this unfortunate news item. 

Too soon indeed. 

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