Mark Rylance, Kenneth Branagh cast in Christopher Nolan’s World War II drama, ‘Dunkirk’
Director Christopher Nolan will be back in 2017 with a World War II drama and now the film is shaping up, adding some big names: Tom Hardy, Kenneth Branagh, and Mark Rylance.
Variety broke the news of the Nolan Dunkirk project.
Nolan is directing the movie from his own original screenplay, set during the evacuation of the French city of Dunkirk in summer 1940. Nolan will again use a combination of IMAX 65mm and 65mm large format film, “for maximum image quality and high impact immersion.”
Shooting will begin this May in Dunkirk. Nolan will additionally produce the film with his longtime partner (and wife) Emma Thomas.
The article states that “while Hardy, Rylance, and Branagh make for a powerful trio, they actually won’t be the main characters.”
Nolan and his team reportedly want unknowns to lead the cast, and have already begun testing teenagers in London. No further details have been revealed about which characters Hardy, Rylance, and Branagh will be playing, though TheWrap speculates they’ll be high-ranking military officers.
Hardy has worked with Nolan twice before, in Inception and The Dark Knight Rises. He can currently be seen in Alejandro González Iñárritu’s The Revenant, acting circles around his Inception co-star Leonardo DiCaprio.
Neither Rylance nor Branagh have worked with Nolan before, but like Hardy, both had great years.
Rylance is getting Oscar buzz for his supporting role in Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies, and will next be seen as the title character in Spielberg’s The BFG.
Branagh most recently directed Cinderella, which grossed $542 million worldwide and won over critics everywhere.
Dunkirk arrives in theaters July 21, 2017.
