Paramount Pictures is on board to distribute Michael Mann’s “Enzo Ferrari” pic with Christian Bale set to play the iconic auto magnate, sources confirm.

Mann will direct with Vendian Entertainment and YooZoo Bliss Film Fund financing the highly anticipated project, which will shoot next summer in Italy. Paramount is handling worldwide distribution rights except for territories being handled by Vincent Maraval’s Insiders.

The movie takes place in 1957 and follows the personal story of Ferrari and his sprawling world as he faces a brutal challenge to his survival.

Mann will produce along with Vendian and YooZoo Bliss. YooZoo Pictures also will distribute the film in China. Vincent Maraval’s Insiders will commence international sales on selected territories at next month’s American Film Market.

Troy Kennedy-Martin penned the script, which is based on the biography “Enzo Ferrari, The Man, the Cars, the Races,” with David Rayfiel and Mann doing a recent polish.

CAA, which represents Mann, arranged financing for the film and brokered the distribution deals. Production partners also include Vittorio Cecchi Gori and Gabrielle Israeliovici.

Bale can be seen next in Paramount’s “The Big Short” and just wrapped production the Terry George-directed “The Promise.” He is repped by WME.

During the 1957 Mille Miglia, near the town of Guidizzolo, a 4.0-litre Ferrari 335S driven by Alfonso de Portago was traveling at 250 km/h when it blew a tire and crashed into the roadside crowd, killing de Portago, his co-driver and nine spectators, five of whom were children. In response, Enzo Ferrari and Englebert, the tyre manufacturer, were charged with manslaughter in a lengthy criminal prosecution that was finally dismissed in 1961.

Paramount Pictures has picked up distribution rights to Michael Mann’s long-in-the-works Ferrari project, titled Enzo Ferrari.

At the same time, Noomi Rapace is in talks to star opposite Christian Bale, who will play Enzo Ferrari, the Italian auto mogul. The long-gestating project finally got traction when it secured funding from Vendian and YooZoo Bliss Film Fund. YooZoo will distribute the movie in China, while Vincent Maraval’s Insiders will begin selling territories at AFM.

The project adapts the 1991 book Enzo Ferrari: The Man, the Cars, the Races, the Machine, written by Brock Yates.

The book recounted Ferrari’s ascent — working for Alfa Romeo, first as a racer and then as a developer, founding his own company in 1947, racing victories in the '50s and '60s, letting Fiat slowly take control of the company. But it also showed Ferrari's tyrannical and manipulative nature, how he pushed drivers to the breaking point (and even death), his hatred of his lifelong marriage and his many affairs.

If a deal is made, Rapace would play Ferrari’s wife, Laura Dominica.

The project is eyeing an $80 million budget, although Mann has a tendency to skid his numbers higher when actual shooting starts.

The last time Mann worked with Paramount was in 2004, when the studio released Collateral, the DreamWorks-made thriller starring Tom Cruise and Jamie Foxx.

EXCLUSIVE: Christian Bale is reluctantly getting out of the driver’s seat on Michael Mann’s long-gestating Enzo Ferrari. The shape-shifting actor is stepping aside after health concerns over the weight gain necessary to play the iconic carmaker. Bale, who has yo-yo’d throughout his career between extreme weight loss and gain – compare his emaciated turn in The Machinist to his button-busting fatso in American Hustle – appears to have finally bitten off more than even he could chew.

The start date of spring this year was simply too soon for the Big Short actor to get that out of shape again. Mann is moving fast to re-cast the plum role and is currently speaking to some heavyweight actors.

While Bale’s exit is a blow, the project remains very much on track, with Paramount distributing in most territories. The combination of Mann, subject matter and role should lend itself to finding another top actor shortly. Vendian Entertainment and YooZoo Bliss Film Fund are financing the project, with plans to shoot this summer in Italy. YooZoo Pictures also will distribute Enzo Ferrari in China.

Set in 1957, Enzo Ferrari is the intimate story of the driver and his sprawling world, veering from comedy to drama as Ferrari faces a brutal challenge to his survival. The script by Troy Kennedy-Martin (The Italian Job and Edge Of Darkness) was revised by David Rayfiel (The Firm) and Mann. It’s based on the Brock Yates book Enzo Ferrari, The Man, The Cars, The Races. Mann’s reps at CAA arranged financing for the film and brokered the distribution deals. Mann has been working on Enzo Ferrari for 15 years, initially shaping it with the late Sydney Pollack.

EXCLUSIVE: Michael Mann’s Ferrari is revving again, with Hugh Jackman now in talks to play Enzo Ferrari, and Noomi Rapace to play his estranged wife Linda. Their relationship, as fiery and combustible as the race cars that Ferrari designed, plays a big part in the script Mann wrote. They have loosely been discussing this teaming for months, and now things are starting to move for a summer 2018 production start. This comes as Jackman’s final Wolverine turn, Logan, has become a box office juggernaut, grossing north of $250 million worldwide in its first week and about to pass $100 million in domestic grosses.

Ferrari is the drama Mann started in partnership with the late director Sydney Pollack almost 17 years ago. The film takes place in 1957, a year where passion, failure, success and death and life all collided in Ferrari’s battle for supremacy against rival Maserati. Christian Bale was going to play Ferrari two years ago, but developed health concerns when he began putting on weight. That should be easier for Jackman. He is a close physical match for Ferrari, and no longer has to obsessively count every calorie and bench press rep. Never has a star showed up as consistently ripped for such a sustained period, as Jackman has for the entirety of his Wolverine appearances in the X-Men films and the spinoff trilogy that concluded with Logan. The reward here could be a few bowls of pasta, playing the Italian automotive icon.