Director Zhang Yimou has tapped Christian Bale to star in Nanjing Heroes, a big-budget drama about the Nanjing Massacre (also known as the Rape of Nanjing). Bale's set to play an American priest who helps shelter students and prostitutes during the invasion of Nanjing by Japanese soldiers."We've made many, many Nanjing movies, but they are mostly like we're talking to ourselves. A lot of young people in Western countries might not know about it," Zhang said in a press conference reported on by the AP. "So I think that perhaps by doing it this way...could let maybe 100 or 200 million young audiences watch this film and maybe then they'll know what happened in Nanjing in 1937."
Nanjing Heroes is based on Yan Geling's book, roughly translated as The 13 Women of Nanjing, and recounts the story of the Japanese army's atrocities during the December 1937 invasion in which they raped and killed hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians.
Filming on the $90 million war story is expected to begin this January, with Bale squeezing this project in before heading off to make his third appearance as Batman in The Dark Knight Rises.
More on Christian Bale:
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- Exclusive photos of Christian Bale and his Fighter co-stars
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