Bin Laden Movie Assembles Cast as U.S. Investigation Heats Up

Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal are closing in the cast of their Osama Bin Laden movie, the hot button story of Navy SEAL Team Six’s take-down of the terrorist leader.

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Joel Edgerton, Jessica Chastain, Edgar Ramirez, Mark Strong, as well Chris Pratt and Jason Clarke, are in negotiations to join the movie, which will shoot this year for a planned Dec. 19 release. The filmmakers are eyeing a February start date. Megan Ellison's Annapurna is financing.

Columbia Pictures picked up U.S. distribution rights to the project in May 2011. The duo behind the Oscar-winning thriller The Hurt Locker had been working for some time on the project in the context of the hunt for Bin Laden and were eyeing a summer 2011 start when Bin Laden’s killing by a black ops team changed the 
project.

Boal spent the latter part of the year incorporating the developments into the script even as actors circled the project.

Underscoring the heat on the movie is scrutiny a key Republican in Congress who alleges the Obama White House gave improper information about the Bin Laden raid to the Hollywood filmmakers.

On Thursday, Rep. Peter King, head of the House Homeland Security Committee, released a December letter from the Pentagon saying that the inspector general's office covering intelligence matters "will address actions taken by Department of Defense personnel related to the release of information to the filmmakers."

King, R-N.Y., also released a November letter from the CIA saying that its office of public affairs was developing a "single point of reference that will govern future interactions with the entertainment industry."

Edgerton recently starred in the Lionsgate movie Warrior while Chastain was catapaulted into the spotlight for her work in The Help and Tree of Life and is making her Broadway debut with The Heiress. Strong played Sinestro is Green Lantern while Ramirez will be seen as god of war Ares in Wrath of the Titans.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Email: Borys.Kit@thr.com

Twitter: @Borys_Kit