Saura, Querejeta re-team on '33 dias'

MADRID -- Spain's Carlos Saura is attached to direct "33 dias," about Pablo Picasso's emotional turmoil as he painted masterpiece "Guernica." Title refers to the time Picasso spent on the mural, which captured his reaction to the destruction of Basque town of Guernica in 1937 by the Nazi Luftwaffe during the Spanish Civil War. Project re-teams Saura with Elias Querejeta, producer of many of Saura's modern classics: "The Hunt," "Raise Ravens" and "Deprisa, deprisa." Saura and Querejeta penned the script alongside French writer Louis-Charles Sirjacq. Budgeted over Euros6 million ($7.7 million), pic is produced by Bilbao-based Idem 4. Production company Cinevedas, with offices in France, Canada and India, will co-produce. Triple Academy Award-winning cinematographer Vittorio Storaro ("Apocalypse Now," "Reds," "The Last Emperor") is in advanced negotiations to join the project, producer Alberto Rojo told Variety. "33 dias" would mark Saura and Storaro's seventh collaboration. The French- and Spanish-language shoot rolls next summer in Paris and Guernica, where producers will reproduce Picasso's Paris studio. Producers are talking to an international cast that could include French thesp Jose Garcia as Picasso. Some of the new project's story line, drama and key images will draw on Saura's prior fiction pics with Storaro, such as "Goya in Bordeaux," "Tango" and "Io, Don Giovanni," Rojo added. In the film, Saura shows how painting "Guernica" was near salvation for Picasso at a moment of personal crisis. "Dias" "focuses on Picasso's relationship with (his lover) Dora Maar, a fascinating character," Saura told Spanish newspaper El Pais. Contact the Variety newsroom at news@variety.com