Oscar winner Helen Mirren and Pete Postlethwaite are to star in a big-screen remake of Graham Greene’s 1939 novel Brighton Rock, alongside Sam Riley, who will take the central role of Pinkie Brown, and Andrea Riseborough, who will play Rose Brown.
The new adaptation, from Spooks producer Kudos Pictures in association with BBC Films, will shift the story to 1964, a year in which south coast clashes occurred between teenage mods and older rockers.
Brighton Rock was adapted as a film in 1947, directed by John Boulting and with Richard Attenborough as the razor-wielding teenager Pinkie.
Riley, who won critical acclaim for his portrayal of the Joy Division singer Ian Curtis in Control, will follow Attenborough in the Pinkie role. Riseborough, who was nominated for a Bafta for her portrayal of a young Margaret Thatcher in BBC4 drama The Long Walk to Finchley, will play the young waitress seduced by Pinkie Brown after she stumbles on evidence linking him and his gang to a killing.
Mirren will star as Ida Arnold, the amateur detective who sets out to find the truth of the killing, while Postlethwaite plays Brighton gangster Phil Corkery.
The movie, which is due to start shooting in October on location in Brighton and London, will be adapted and directed by Rowan Joffe in his debut directing feature. He previously co-wrote the movie 28 Days Later and directed Channel 4′s The Shooting of Thomas Hurndall, for which he won a Bafta.
Joffe said he moved the action to 1964, which was also the last year in which the death penalty was actively carried out, to refresh the story.
“We’re making Brighton Rock as contemporary as we possibly can because the story feels ‘modern’. It’s too alive, too vibrant and too relevant to be contained in the late 1930s,” he said.
“Any form of adaptation is corruption. And Greene – who lovingly and pragmatically corrupted much of his own work to fit the big screen – would have been the first to understand that.”
Producer Paul Webster, whose credits include Atonement, added: “Rowan has written a formidable script that has attracted a cast that is a perfect blend of youth and experience. The scene is set to make a truly great British gangster film.”
Christine Langan, the creative director of BBC Films, said Joffe’s adaptation was a “very powerful piece of writing”.
“The confidence of his work to date, the brilliant cast he has assembled and the strength of the team behind him, make Brighton Rock a truly exciting debut feature and one which BBC Films is very happy to support,” she said.
Brighton Rock will be made by Kudos Pictures and Optimum Releasing, in association with BBC Films and the UK Film Council’s Premiere Fund. The film has also been supported by the UK Film Council’s Development Fund through Optimum Releasing and StudioCanal.
