HC lands book rights to Dunkirk film starring Tom Hardy

HarperCollins division William Collins has acquired world rights to Dunkirk: The History Behind the Major Motion Picture by Joshua Levine.

The title explores the "harrowing" true stories that inspired the epic action thriller “Dunkirk,” a motion picture, written and directed by Christopher Nolan and opening in cinemas on 21st July 2017. The film features an ensemble cast which includes Kenneth Branagh, Cillian Murphy, Mark Rylance, Harry Styles and Tom Hardy.

In 1940, more than 300,000 Allied troops were trapped on the beaches of Dunkirk, France, surrounded by the advancing German Army, and attacked from the air by the Luftwaffe. Their only hope was a seaborne evacuation carried out by a civilian armada. The true history of the soldiers, sailors, airmen and civilians involved in the nine-day skirmish has "passed into legend", the publisher said. Now, the story Winston Churchill described as a "miracle" is narrated by author Levine in its "full, sweeping context", including new interviews with veterans and survivors.

Levine’s Dunkirk: The History Behind the Major Motion Picture is the dramatic account of events surrounding the retreat that paved the way to "ultimate victory and preserved liberty for generations to come".

Tom Killingbeck, commissioning editor for William Collins, said: “Having worked on Christopher Nolan’s ‘Dunkirk’ as a historical consultant, Joshua Levine is the perfect writer to bring the reality behind the film to life. His account is enormously entertaining and well-researched, and will bring revelation after revelation to any cinema-goer curious to know more about the history of the evacuation.”

The book will be published by HarperCollins in all its English language divisions around the world, including William Morrow in the U.S. It will also be published by HarperCollins in the local languages of Brazil, Poland, France, Holland, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Japan, as well as in Spanish in the US and Latin America.