Christoph Waltz has signed on to star in the thriller True Crimes, with Roman Polanski emerging as a potential candidate to direct.

The project is adapted from a 2008 New Yorker article by David Gann about the mysterious case of Krystian Bala, a Polish writer who was convicted of murder. A cold case for years, the murder was described as the perfect crime. While Krystian Bala was never a suspect, he published a novel that described a murder strikingly similar to the one that had confounded local police for years.

Christoph Waltz is playing Polish police officer Jacek Wroblewski, who re-opens the case and is sucked into an underworld of sex rings and drugs. The tone of the story has been compared to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

Brett Ratner, John Cheng and David Gerson are producing the thriller, which was initially set up at Focus Features before they put the project into turnaround. The producers are currently seeking a new distribution partner.

Christoph Waltz took home his second Oscar earlier this year for his role in Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained. He also recently signed on for a role in Stephen Gaghan's The Candy Store.