EXCLUSIVE: Fresh off James Cameron’s $1.5BN-grossing Avatar: Fire and Ash, co-stars Stephen Lang and Sam Worthington are reteaming on crime-thriller Eyes Along the Valley, on which they’re joined by Luke Bracey (Hacksaw Ridge).
Kriv Stenders (Danger Close) is directing with Architect launching worldwide sales ahead of Cannes.
The movie also re-teams Hacksaw Ridge co-stars Worthington and Bracey — who wrote the screenplay with Johnny McCoy and Timothy Burnett — with director Kriv Stenders, and producers John and Michael Schwarz, following their Vietnam war action epic Danger Close.
Worthington and Bracey “star as Pollock and McArthur, two tenacious veteran detectives in 1950s Australia. United by a series of missing person cases, they’re led to a vast, sprawling and remote ranch in the remote Outback. Isolated, out on a limb, and each struggling with their own demons, the partners unwittingly stumble into a spider’s web: a highly intelligent, resourceful and implacable serial killer (Lang), himself scarred by war and hidden undiscovered for decades, is remorselessly stalking them. The hunters have become the hunted.”
The film is due to shoot on location in New South Wales, Australia, at a date to be confirmed.
John Schwarz and Michael Schwarz produce for Deeper Water Films (Gold), together with Timothy Burnett and Erin Moy for Entropico (Onefour: Against All Odds), and Luke Bracey. Natalie Coleman is executive producing.
Sydney’s Spectrum Films are handling post production. Heads of department include director of photography Thomaz Labanca (Beast), production designer Sam Hobbs (Beast), sound designer Sam Hayward (EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert) and editor Veronika Jenet (The Piano).
In addition to Danger Close, Stenders is best known for his hit Red Dog franchise, the first instalment of which is Australia’s eighth highest-grossing movie of all time. He also directed The Correspondent, starring Richard Roxburgh, ABC series Jack Irish, starring Guy Pearce, and Kill Me Three Times, starring Simon Pegg and Teresa Palmer, which premiered at TIFF.
Architect’s Calum Gray said: “The movie drips atmosphere and environmental grandeur, with hugely memorable characters and an ever ratcheting tension. It will keep audiences pinned to their seats . Lovers of constructed, intelligent thrillers will be absolutely hooked.”
Kriv Stenders added: “I’m delighted to add the supremely talented Stephen Lang, in a wonderfully Machiavellian role, to our world class team of Sam, Luke and John. The screenplay is a classic detective thriller – a taut, tense and atmospheric page turner punctuated with sequences of white knuckle action – about men pushed to their limits by an evil they can barely comprehend.”
Sam Worthington is repped by WME, Shanahan Management and Anonymous Content. Luke Bracey is repped by UTA and Fourward. Stephen Lang is repped by Innovative Artists.
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