Gary Oldman, Guy Pearce, and Mia Wasikowska join John Hillcoat’s The Wettest County in the World

I like John Hillcoat a lot as a director, and his last two feature films – THE PROPOSITION and THE ROAD – are among my favorites of the last five years or so. THE WETTEST COUNTY IN THE WORLD, an adaptation of the novel by Matt Bondurant will be his next, and its cast just keeps getting better and better.

According to THR, joining the already on board Shia LaBeouf and Tom Hardy will be the great Gary Oldman (THE DARK KNIGHT RISES, TINKER, TAILOR, SOLIDER, SPY), Hillcoat chum Guy Pearce (THE PROPOSITION, a brief cameo in THE ROAD), and burgeoning star Mia Wasikowska (ALICE IN WONDERLAND). Also joining the cast will be actor Jason Clarke (one of the stronger elements in Michael Mann’s 2009 gangster flick PUBLIC ENEMIES).

The film – with screenplay by Nick Cave – tells “the true gangsters story details of the saga of the Bondurant boys, bootlegging siblings who take the law into their own hands in Prohibition-era Virginia while making a run for the American Dream.” Oldman will play a gangster that first gets the boys into delivering alcohol while Pearce will be an overly violent deputy that comes down hard on the Bondurants. Wasikowska will play LaBeouf’s love interest. Clarke will portray LaBeouf and Hardy’s brother.

THE WETTEST COUNTY IN THE WORLD is set to begin production at the end of this month.