Oliver Hirschbiegel, director of the Oscar-nominated Hitler drama ‘Downfall’, has signed on to direct an upcoming biopic on lesser-known Nazi resistance fighter Georg Elser.
Elser, a simple carpenter, attempted to assassinate Hitler on November 8, 1939, said the Hollywood Reporter.
Elsner was arrested on the Swiss border and sent to a concentration camp. He was killed there in 1945, just a few days before the end of the war, on Hitler’s direct order.
The film stars Christian Friedel as Elsner, Burghart Klaussner as the head of the Nazi’s criminal police and Johann von Bulow (The Stranger in Me) as Gestapo head Heinrich Muller.
Katharina Schuttler plays Elsner’s girlfriend Elsa, who knew nothing of his plans.
Fred Breinersdorfer penned the script to ‘Georg Elser’ which will follow the resistance fighter from his early days living in the Swabian Alps to the assassination attempt and his final hours at Dachau concentration camp.