Apple is Getting Paramount’s ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ Starring DiCaprio and De Niro

Apple is making moves, and we’re watching. According to reports, the streamer has acquired rights to the highly anticipated drama Killers of the Flower Moon which will be directed by Martin Scorsese and star Robert De Niro and Leonardo DiCaprio as the lead roles. Paramount shopped the film around with Apple’s final winning bid reportedly at about $180 million to $200 million.

This is the second big-name film Apple has tossed its hat in the ring for and won. Apple recently announced Tom Hank’s WWII drama Greyhound would be hitting the streaming platform and skipping theaters entirely, According to Deadline, the bidding war for the film drove the winning price up to around $70 million range with Apple ultimately beating out competing streaming services for the win.

With this new acquisition for Killers of the Flower Moon, Apple will finance and be in charge of creative and production, while Paramount will distribute the finished film in theaters before it hits Apple TV+ for streaming.

As a Western, Killers of the Flower Moon will be partially shot on location in Oklahoma. The movie is based on American journalist David Grann’s book by the same name. The book investigates a series of murders of wealthy Osage people that took place in Osage County, Oklahoma in the early 1920s—after big oil deposits were discovered beneath their land. After the Osage Native Americans are awarded rights in court to the profits made from oil deposits found on their land, the Osage people prepare for receiving the wealth to which they believe they are legally entitled from sales of their oil deposits.