Greyhound, the Tom Hanks-fronted World War II drama, is headed to AppleTV+. The movie was picked up by the streaming service in a competitive situation from Sony Pictures.
Set in the early days of WWII, the film, based on C.S. Forester’s novel The Good Shepherd, follows Capt. Ernest Krause (Hanks) as he leads an international convoy of 37 Allied ships in his first command on a U.S. destroyer. The group crosses the treacherous ocean as they are pursued by wolf packs of Nazi U-boats.
Along with Hanks and Gary Goetzman’s Playtone, Sony Pictures/Stage Six Films were behind the movie, which was written by Hanks and directed by Aaron Schneider and produced by Goetzman.
Before the coronavirus pandemic, which delayed the release of Greyhound indefinitely, Sony had pushed the pic’s bow from May 8 to June 12. In the wake of COVID-19 concerns, with theaters shuttered and having redated films like Morbius and Ghostbusters: Afterlife, the studio has offloaded some theatrical titles to streaming, including the Sundance movie Charm City Kings and the Seth Rogen comedy American Pickle.
Several other high-profile studio-to-streaming moves include Paramount selling The Lovebirds to Netflix, STX setting up My Spy at Amazon and the Warner Bros. teen drama Clouds moving to Disney+.
Greyhound will mark the biggest movie release to date for Apple, whose features have included the Sundance film Hala and the period pic The Banker. Upcoming films for the service include Sofia Coppola‘s On the Rocks and the doc Boys State.
