Brad Pitt To Star In David Leitch's 'Bullet Train', About Assassins On A Train

Brad Pitt is boarding David Leitch's Bullet Train. The Sony Pictures action thriller, which reunites Leitch and Pitt after the actor made a cameo in Deadpool 2, will be Leitch's follow-up to Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw and Pitt's latest starring role after career-best performances in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and Ad Astra.Variety broke the news that Brad Pitt is set to lead the Bullet Train cast in Leitch's upcoming action thriller about a group of assassins on a speeding train in Tokyo. Based on the Japanese novel Maria Beetle by bestselling author Kotaro Isaka, Bullet Train will be directed by Leitch, who is supervising the script from Zak Olkewicz. This is Leitch's highly anticipated follow-up to the disappointing Hobbs & Shaw, after the director became a hot Hollywood commodity with films like Deadpool 2 and Atomic Blonde. Leitch had been taking his time to pick his next film, and only recently committed to Bullet Train, Variety reports.Bullet Train "centers on a group of hitmen and assassins with conflicting motives on a train in Tokyo" and is being compared to films like Speed and the 2014 Liam Neeson movie Non-Stop. It's unclear which role Pitt would play, but considering his star status, it's likely he'll be the lead. The prospect of seeing Pitt play a hitman is exciting despite the potential drawbacks of the film (Leitch has proven to perform consistently at the box office, but critically his films have left a lot to be desired), as the actor has mostly kept himself to roles in prestige dramas lately, or simply behind the scenes as a powerhouse producer of acclaimed films like Moonlight. Though it was a blast hanging out with Pitt in Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (for which he won his first acting Oscar), the actor hasn't really unleashed his less self-serious side at the movies since the mid-2000s when he starred in the Ocean's films and Mr. and Mrs. Smith.

Sony reportedly plans to shoot Bullet Train this fall, with the understanding that since the film is meant to be shot on one contained set, it'll be easier to operate under the new coronavirus-influenced health restrictions that film productions need to take into consideration. However, Variety reports that no start date is set in stone yet. Sony is distributing, while Leitch is producing along with Kelly McCormick, Antoine Fuqua (who was attached to direct at one point), and Kat Samick.