Wayne Kramer is a director who started fast but has watched his career slowly fade into mediocrity. His first major feature, 2003's The Cooler, earned an Oscar nomination of Alec Baldwin, but his two films since, Running Scared and Crossing Over, were both viewed disparagingly by critics, the first being called gratuitously violent and the second labeled as a Crash ripoff (despite being based on a short film Kramer made back in 1996). Now he's hoping a bit of historical drama will get him back on top.

THR reports that Kramer's next venture will be based on famous 1930s gangster Charles Arthur "Pretty Boy" Floyd for Myriad Pictures. Despite being one of the more notable criminals of the era, the man has not received as much screen treatment as men like Al Capone and John Dillinger, though he was portrayed by Channing Tatum in last year's Public Enemies. Written by Kevin Bernhardt, Kramer plans on bringing a "21st century style and energy" to the screenplay "without sacrificing the verisimilitude of the period or over-sensationalizing the characters themselves." According to Kramer, the film will be a crime thriller with hints of romance, as Floyd cannot help but return to the woman he loves, an unbreakable habit that eventually led to his death at 30.

A message to Kramer: watch Michael Mann's Public Enemies; take note of absolutely everything that he did wrong; do the complete opposite. Then you actually might succeed in making a film about a 1930s gangster.