And the winner of the Lucius Malfoy (Hipster Variant) lookalike contest is…. Benedict Cumberbatch! Settle down, Batch-fans (Cumberbundles?*) We kid because we love. That there picture above is actually the first official image from the Julian Assange movie, which is now called The Fifth Estate.
The film, which was previously known as the Untitled WikiLeaks Movie or The Man Who Sold The World, has just started shooting, with director Bill Condon swapping vampires for controversial true-life figures.
Adapted by Josh Singer from David Leigh, Luke Harding and Daniel Domscheit-Berg’s books,** Fifth Estate** will track the heady, early days of WikiLeaks, when the site and Assange himself exploded into worldwide infamy thanks to some highly confidential – and classified – document leaks.
Domscheit-Berg (shown in the picture above as played by Daniel Bruhl), was an early supporter of Assange, and became one of his most trusted confidantes in the organisation. Before, that is, Assange began to believe his own legend.
"It may be decades before we understand the full impact of WikiLeaks and how it's revolutionized the spread of information,” Condon says in a statement released by DreamWorks. “So this film won't claim any long view authority on its subject, or attempt any final judgment. We want to explore the complexities and challenges of transparency in the information age and, we hope, enliven and enrich the conversations WikiLeaks has already provoked."
Laura Linney, Anthony Mackie, David Thewlis, Peter Capaldi, Dan Stevens, Alicia Vikander and Carice van Houten are also among the (hugely impressive) cast for the film, which DreamWorks and Disney will release in the US on November 15. There’s no UK date yet.
*We know that Cumberbatch fans often refer to themselves as "Cumberbitches" but we didn't want to be rude.