Russell Crowe has signed on to star in Overlord director Julius Avery’s upcoming supernatural thriller, The Pope’s Exorcist.

The Academy Award-winning actor will play Father Gabriele Amorth, the real-life figure and legendary Italian priest. Father Amorth is believed to have performed more than 100,000 exorcisms for the Vatican over his sixty-plus years of service for the Church – fun fact, he previously stated both that William Friedkin’s The Exorcist was his favourite film, and that yoga is Satanic practice. An interesting guy, by all accounts.

The Pope’s Exorcist draws on Father Amorth’s international bestselling memoirs, An Exorcist Tells His Story and An Exorcist: More Stories – with further accounts of his exploits coming to light upon his death in 2016. Screen Gems acquired Father Amorth’s life rights for the project, along with the rights to his memoirs. Details of the film are still being kept under wraps.

Evan Spiliotopoulos wrote the current draft with revisions by Chuck MacLean, based on Michael Petroni-revised original drafts by Chester Hastings and R. Dean McCreary. Voices director Ángel Gómez was previously attached to direct the film.

Crowe recently wrapped filming on Sony’s Kraven the Hunter, and will soon be seen in Taika Waititi’s Thor: Love and Thunder.