Writer and director Kiah Roache-Turner will bring together past collaborators Bronte Pictures and Pictures in Paradise for a World War II survival-action thriller to be filmed across Australia and Malta next year.
Set to be launched for sales at the upcoming American Film Market via Cornerstone Films, Beast of War picks up in 1942 with a warship carrying hundreds of Australian soldiers across the Timor Sea to the frontline of WWII. Suddenly, Japanese fighter jets scream out of the sky, and within minutes the ocean becomes a hell of steel, fire, oil and blood.
With the vessel destroyed, a handful of soldiers build a makeshift raft from floating debris as they cling to their lives. Tensions run high between the hot-headed and terrified young men, as they band together in an effort to survive. But their biggest battle is yet to come. In the dark below, a great white shark hunts in the wreckage and is drawn to the smell of fresh blood in the water.
Bronte Pictures’ Blake Northfield and Pictures in Paradise’s Chris Brown are producing, with the pair having previously worked on Roache Turner’s Wyrmwood: Apocalypse and Sting, respectively.
CreatureNFX’s director Paul Trefry, who has previously produced sculptures for James Cameron, Ridley Scott and Baz Luhrmann, will create the practical creature effects from his studio in Australia.
Cornerstone also oversaw international sales for Sting, about a rapidly growing spider that comes under the care of a 12-year-old girl, which will be released by Studiocanal in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, France, Germany, Switzerland and Benelux.