Ah, Gerard Butler and his sports movies. CHASING MAVERICKS didn’t bode so well at the box office and his next one, PLAYING FOR KEEPS, a much lighter soccor pic doesn’t look so hot either. Regardless, Gerard is at it again, this time with a much more intriguing concept, as he’ll star in the WWII-set soccer drama, DYNAMO, a true story based on the novel Dynamo: Defending The Honour Of Kiev by Andy Dougan.
From Deadline:
DYNAMO is based on the landmark soccer game that took place between an occupied Ukrainian soccer team and their Nazi captors during World War II. Butler will star as Nikolai Trusevich, the all-star goalie who served as a cornerstone and leader for his team, and ultimately inspired the entire battered city of Kiev, Ukraine. To stem a rising tide of resistance and establish Aryan superiority, the Nazi’s set up a match pitting the starving Ukrainians against a ‘super team’ of German players that to this day is still known as “The Death Match”.
The details of the actual “Death Match” in question are quite interesting, with shades of THE LONGEST YARD meets ESCAPE FROM SOBIBOR. It has everything from corrupt SS referees, a crowd of Nazi officers, and sacrificies made throughout the game both to preserve Soviet honor and to spit in the face of the Nazis. Many of the players were sent to concentration camps after the victory, some escaping and some dying.
Here’s a photo of the actual Ukranian team (Butler will be playing no. 2):
Currently, directors are being sought for the project with an eye towards shooting in Europe next year. More as this develops. Butler will next be seen (if you ignore PLAYING FOR KEEPS) in the DIE-HARD-in-the-White-House pic OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN set for release on April 5, 2013.
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