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Michael Sheen is set to star in the film adaptation of Owen Sheers' début novel Resistance, with Sheers having co-written the screenplay with director Amit Gupta.

Michael Sheen

According to the , the film is due to be shot around Abergavenny, Sheers' home town.

Richard Holmes and Amanda Faber will produce the film, BAFTA Cymru Award winner Richard Staniforth will act as executive producer, and Oscar-winning Rachel Portman is to score the adaptation. Other actors involved with the project include Andrea Riseborough, who has recently starred in Made In Dagenham, and Tom Wlaschiha - who appeared in recent ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ drama The Deep.

Sheers' Resistance opens in wartime 1944 and describes an alternative history. After the fall of Russia and the failed D-Day landings, a German counter-attack lands on British soil. Within a month, half of Britain is occupied.

In the Welsh border valley of Olchon, the women of the small farming community wake one morning to find their husbands gone. As the isolated, all-female community wait for news a German patrol after arrives in their valley on a mystery mission. During the severe winter that follows, both groups are forced into co-operation.

Owen Sheers. Photo © Charlotte Medlicott

Development support for the project was led by Film Agency Wales, Munich-based distributor Square One and the MEDIA fund in Europe.

Gupta, Sheers, Faber and Holmes commented: "We're delighted with the consistent, intelligent and focused support we've had from the team at the Film Agency. From script to casting they've been truly helpful partners."

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