The director was attached to the studio's Patty Hearst biopic before it was abandoned.


After the Patty Hearst biopic he was attached to direct was abandoned by the studio, Logan director James Mangold is teaming with 20th Century Fox for a feature that centers on the race car battle between Ford and Ferrari.


The untitled movie will follow an eccentric team of American engineers and designers led by automotive visionary Carroll Shelby and his British driver, Ken Miles, who are dispatched by Henry Ford II with the mission of building from scratch an entirely new race car with the potential to finally defeat the perennially dominant Ferrari at the 1966 Le Mans World Championship.


Mangold is developing along with screenwriters Jez and John-Henry Butterworth (Edge of Tomorrow, Get On Up).


Chernin Entertainment, which is gearing up for the release of Jennifer Lawrence spy thriller Red Sparrow, will produce.


It is currently unclear if the Ford/Ferrari movie will be the next feature for the director. He is also attached to Fox crime thriller The Force and isdeveloping a Logan spinoff, X-23.


His Hearst feature was deserted by the studio after the Hearst family criticized Jeffrey Toobin, the author of American Heiress: The Wild Saga of the Kidnapping, Crimes and Trial of Patty Hearst, which was serving as the basis for the biopic. (A CNN documentary also based on the book, The Radical Story of Patty Hearst, is still set to air starting Feb. 11.)


Mangold, whose credits also include Walk the Line and The Wolverine, is repped by WME and Management 360.