DanielBruehl Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Just to lighten things up after word that Vincent Perez's life is going to hit the big screen, Variety reports that Israeli director Eytan Fox is teaming up with X Filme International for a film based on Gad Beck. Fox is currently writing the mostly-English script with partner and collaborator Gal Uchovsky, to film on location in Germany. While the subject matter is still heavy, this time around the hero has a better fate.

As a gay Jew, Beck had fled from the Nazis, joined the Jewish resistance, and saved dozens of Jewish people from being murdered. According to Uchovsky, "It's a complicated story because Gad's mother was originally a German Christian who converted to Judaism, so he had quite a large German family in Berlin. The Nazis would call someone like Gad a mischling, or half-Jew, so the film will also look at those relations." With a solid $6-$10 milliion price tag, they're hoping to land an American actor as Gad, so this could be a fairly high-profile project. Personally, looking at the pic of Gad to the right, I'm thinking Alan Cumming.

Although it happened many years ago, the Nanjing/Nanking Massacre has been pretty prevalent in media lately. In January, Kim Voynar reviewed the film from Sundance, and mentioned some of the other pictures in the works, but this one, John Rabe, is yet another. Rabe was one of the westerners in Nanjing who created a safety zone in the city that protected many Chinese inhabitants from the Japanese occupiers -- estimates say that these actions saved a few hundred thousand lives. He was a German businessman and what makes things more interesting -- he was also a member of the Nazi party.

The film already stars Ulrich Tukur (The Lives of Others) as Rabe, and an international cast of actors including Anne Consigny, Ly Huand, and Akira Emoto. Now Variety reports that Steve Buscemi and Daniel Bruehl (The Bourne Ultimatum) have been added to the cast. There is no word on who Bruehl will play, and I presume it isn't a fast-food terrorist this time around, but Buscemi is taking on the role of "American doctor Robert Wilson, who remained in Nanjing during the occupation to care for legions of victims." Not too bad for Mr. Pink, who has really been breaking out of his typecasting lately. The film is currently in production in Shanghai and Nanjing, and is set to come out late next year.