Director Zack Snyder has found his next project, which for the first time since 2013’s Man of Steel will take him away from the DC Extended Universe and out of comic book adaptations. According to THR, his next film will instead be The Last Photograph, about a war correspondent and the conflict in Afghanistan.
According to the report, Snyder still plans to direct the sequel to next year’s Justice League, but that film’s schedule is supposedly on hold to make room for Ben Affleck’s The Batman. That’s opened up some time in Snyder’s schedule, allowing him to make The Last Photograph, a project that he and 300 scribe Kurt Johnstad came up with about ten years ago.
The film features a war correspondent in Afghanistan who “is the only one to survive an attack on a group of Americans. When a special ops soldier in search of a family member shows up, the two team up, with the correspondent hoping to score the story of his life.”
In 2011, a deal was in place for Snyder to direct the film, which would have seen Christian Bale and Sean Penn in the lead roles. In the years since, however, their deals, as well as Snyder’s and Johnstad’s, have lapsed. Now, Snyder will give the script and update and a polish while contracts are renegotiated. Snyder’s wife and longtime production partner Deborah Snyder will produce the film, which is aiming to start production in late 2017.