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'Inglourious Basterds' Star Replaces James McAvoy in Wikileaks Film

by Ben Pearson
November 28, 2012
Source: THR

Unless you spotted him in a small role in The Bourne Ultimatum, American audiences got their best look at German actor Daniel Brühl when he played the sniper-turned-movie-star Fredrick Zoller in Quentin Tarantino's 2009 film Inglourious Basterds. He hasn't acted in much on this side of the world since then, but according to THR, Brühl is now set to replace James McAvoy in the Wikileaks movie that The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn director Bill Condon is directing for DreamWorks. The film follows Julian Assange, the founder of the site that had the world on edge as it exposed dozens of secret government documents.

This film has already seen its share of actor shakeups, since it was originally supposed to star Jeremy Renner as Assange but "Sherlock" star Benedict Cumberbatch stepped up to replace him. Laura Linney just signed on this past Monday in an unknown role, so even with the shifting of cast members and a script from newcomer Josh Singer, it looks like this one is going to turn out with some great talent attached. From what we can gather, most of the movie hinges on Assange's relationship with Daniel Domscheit-Berg (Brühl), who started out working with the influential webmaster before leaving the site due to conflicting ethical ideologies. I'm looking forward to seeing more from Brühl since he hasn't done many mainstream films, and if he can hold his own against a rising star like Cumberbatch, we might have another future A-lister on our hands. Thoughts?

Filed under Casting, Movie News

From around the web:

JM

He is a really great actor (telling you from Europe, having seen him in some good roles)
poo

he hasnt acted much? he just did rush with ron howard. he literally just came off a movie. bruhl is fuckin tearin it up right now
Arbed121

I reckon James McAvoy did a bit of background research and decided to get himself the hell off of this movie. "Nah, I think X-Men maybe..." Apparently, Wikileaks has already suggested a title for this movie. They're calling it Dreamworks' ANTI-Wikileaks movie. Hmm. Not a good sign. Maybe that's because Daniel Domscheit-Berg's book, which this film will be based on, is full of self-promoting - but easily spottable - lies. According to Der Spiegel, Domscheit-Berg is also heavily involved in the film's production as a consultant. This is the man who sabotaged the Wikileaks submission platform, stole money and unpublished whistleblower submissions from them, conducted endless interviews smearing Julian Assange, publicised where the passphrase to the unredacted cableset could be found (David Leigh, Guardian journalist's book chapter title!!!) and, to cap it all, DESTROYED 3,500 unpublished document that whistleblowers had submitted to Wikileaks, risking all to get the truth out to the public. Doubtless this is the man who this film will portray as the noble hero of information transparency, while Assange is portrayed as an narcisist and meglomaniac. The truth turned upsidedown.