Former Royal Navy submariner Roger Chapman, of Woodland, was aboard Pisces III, a 6ft deep-sea submersible which was trapped on the Atlantic Shelf for three days from August 29, 1973.
Mr Chapman, who was 28 at the time, was working on a contract to bury transoceanic telephone cables.
He was trapped alongside father-of-four Roger Mallinson 1,575ft beneath the waves 150-miles off the coast of Ireland before an 84-hour international rescue operation fetched them back above the surface, as concerns mounted that their oxygen supplies would run out.
Mr Chapman, 68, has been in talks with Giant Films regarding the translation of his story to the cinema screen and A-listers Ewan McGregor and Jude Law are among the stars interested in recreating the story for the movie version.
He said: “It’s not my call but if Ewan McGregor is interested and wanted to go for playing me it would be nice. I think that this company want to stick to the story.”
After being rescued the pair were greeted by hundreds of people and Mr Chapman said he was “euphoric” on release.
Mr Chapman said he was confident the story would not be overly revised like US-produced films such as U571 after a number of meetings with the potential film-makers. He said: “It has been a long slog. A Canadian film company bought the rights to the book (No Time On Our Side) a few years ago and they were going for a big budget film but the rights expired last year.
“I think that Giant want to stick to the story – they’re UK based and we’ve met several times.
“I’m confident that something will happen.”
Mr Chapman is still involved in the submarine industry working for James Fisher Defence, based in Barrow.
In 2005 the company he founded, James Fisher Rumic, was involved in saving seven Russian submariners trapped in the mini-sub Priz, at a depth of 625ft off Russia’s far eastern Kamchatka peninsula.
The father-of-two told the Evening Mail his sons Marcus and Sam have been wholly supportive of the film project and were looking forward to seeing their father’s story told on the silver screen.
