Michael Fassbender joins Terrence Malicks latest

Michael Fassbender is the latest star to join Terrence Malick’s currently untitled drama.

The German-Irish actor was snapped on set opposite Ryan Gosling (above, via The Playlist ), who has been attached to the project for some time. Also locked into the enviably talented cast are Natalie Portman, Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara and Haley Bennett.

Plot and character specifics are nowhere to be found at the moment (standard procedure for a Malick flick), although that superlative combination of talent is a droolworthy prospect.

For anyone having trouble keeping up, this untitled drama is the third film that the usually unhurried Malick has worked on in the space of a year.

Relationship drama To The Wonder has been screened at the Venice and Toronto film festivals, but has yet to secure a release date.

After that, Malick quickly set to work on Knight Of Cups , an LA-set drama tackling celebrity and excess. Sharing a number of cast members with ‘Untitled’, Knight stars Bale, Blanchett and Portman, as well as Joel Kinnaman and Antonio Banderas.

With that one in post-production, Malick’s skipped onto this untitled drama (previously Lawless before John Hillcoat’s, erm, Lawless took the title). A look at obsession and betrayal via two intersecting love triangles, it’s set against the Austin, Texas music scene.

Fassbender's one in-demand actor, with appearances lined up in Twelve Years A Slave , The Counselor , Frank , Jane Got A Gun and X-Men: Days Of Future Past , not to mention a possible return to duty on Ridley Scott's Prometheus sequel, and a producer-star role in Assassin's Creed .

For now, none of Malick’s forthcoming features have UK release dates, although it’s possible they’ll all be released in 2013.

Matt Maytum
Editor, Total Film

I'm the Editor at Total Film magazine, overseeing the running of the mag, and generally obsessing over all things Nolan, Kubrick and Pixar. Over the past decade I've worked in various roles for TF online and in print, including at GamesRadar+, and you can often hear me nattering on the Inside Total Film podcast. Bucket-list-ticking career highlights have included reporting from the set of Tenet and Avengers: Infinity War, as well as covering Comic-Con, TIFF and the Sundance Film Festival.