Steven Spielberg has announced that he will be directing a film titled "The Post" starring Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep. The director said that pre-production for the film is already underway and the shoot is set to begin sometime in May.
Based on the said information, it is safe to assume that "The Post" will be ready for release to qualify for the Academy season. The film will reportedly have some meaty material too, specifically focusing on the Washington Post's role in exposing the Pentagon Papers in 1971, Deadline reported.
This is the second Oscar bait that will tackle the story of "Washington Post| editor Bradlee after "All The President's Men." The upcoming film is based on Liz Hanna's script and will be produced by Spielberg himself and Kristie Macosko Krieger.
This will be Hank's fifth collaboration with Spielberg. The two have worked together in hit movies "Saving Private Ryan," "Catch Me If You Can," "The Terminal" and "Bridge of Spies." Streep on the other hand has worked with the acclaimed director in "A.I. Artificial Intelligence" and is set to narrate "Five Came Back," a Netflix documentary executively produced by Spielberg, New York Daily News reported.
For the uninitiated, the Pentagon Papers is a classified Department of Defense study examining the military presence of the United States in Vietnam between 1945-1967. The papers revealed that the U.S. had been engaged in bombing other countries during the Vietnam war namely Cambodia and Laos, none of which were reported in the mainstream media.
The papers were released by Daniel Ellsberg who had worked and study and brought it to public attention. Ellsberg was initially charged with conspiracy, espionage, and theft of government property. Shortly after the Watergate Scandal, the charges were dropped when the prosecutors discovered that the staff members of then president Nixon had ordered unlawful efforts to discredit Ellsberg. For more background, watch the clip below:
