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LOS ANGELES >> “The Hurt Locker” team of director Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal have found a home for their new film centered on the mission that ultimately captured and killed Osama bin Laden. Sony Pictures has acquired the U.S. distribution rights to the movie, which will begin filming late this summer. The studio intends to release the movie in the fourth quarter of 2012.
Bigelow and Boal, who walked away from the 2010 Academy Awards with seven Oscars for their film on an elite Army bomb squad in Iraq, have been working the bin Laden project since 2008 and plan to include the recent events of the last month into the film. Australian actor Joel Edgerton is negotiating to play one of the Navy SEALS involved in the mission.
Says Amy Pascal, co-chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment, “With the death of Osama bin Laden, this film could not be more relevant. Kathryn and Mark have an outstanding perspective on the team that was hunting the most wanted man in the world.”
Bigelow and Boal will produce the project with Annapurna Pictures’ Megan Ellison and executive producer Greg Shapiro (”The Hurt Locker”).
