Filmmaker to tackle a feature based on the Dreyfus affair.
Roman Polanski has announced that he is set to make the political thriller ‘D’ is next directorial effort. Penned by Robert Harris, the film is based on one of the most sensational political scandals and miscarriages of justice in history, the Dreyfus affair.
“In December 1894, Captain Alfred Dreyfus, one of the few Jewish officers on the General Staff of the French Army, was subjected to a secret court martial for passing secrets to the Germans. Found guilty, he was sentenced to life imprisonment and sent to Devil’s Island.
However, the man charged with making sure Dreyfus never returned – Colonel Georges Picquart, the newly-appointed head of French counter-intelligence – gradually began to realize a huge mistake had been made and the real traitor was still at large. His attempts to prove it led him into a direct clash with his superiors. Picquart himself was then framed for crimes he had not committed and sent to prison.
It was to be twelve years before Dreyfus was eventually cleared of all charges. By then, the case had become one of the most talked-about events in the world.”
The independently financed film will begin casting shortly and has plans to begin principal photography in Paris by the end of this year.