Pitt outbids DiCaprio for zombie film rights

In a high-six-figure deal, Paramount Pictures acquired screen rights to the Max Brooks novel "World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War." Brad Pitt's Plan B will produce.

Brooks' follow-up to satire "The Zombie Survial Guide" sparked a bidding battle, with Warner Bros. and Leonardo DiCaprio’s Appian Way on the other side of the table from Par and Pitt.

Book is a sober telling of the aftermath of a war fought against a legion of humans who were inflicted with a virus, died and were reanimated into flesh-eating zombies.

"World War Z" will be published in the fall by Crown.