Steven Spielberg to direct Jennifer Lawrence in war photographer biopic

Warner Bros, teaming with Steven Spielberg and Jennifer Lawrence, have won a bidding war to adapt a war photographer’s harrowing memoir.

Lynsey Addario’s book It’s What I Do: A Photographer’s Life of Love and War, published earlier this year, has been widely acclaimed by the likes of the New York Times and The New Republic, and picked out by iTunes and Amazon.

Addario tells the story of becoming a photojournalist after being inspired by a Sebastião Salgado exhibition, before getting her big break documenting life as a woman under the Taliban – a story that gained global significance following 9/11. She subsequently reported from Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel, Congo and Libya; she was kidnapped in the latter country by Gaddafi’s army, her driver was killed, and she was threatened with murder and rape.

After her kidnap ordeal, she returned to her husband, started a family, and took a step back from the frontline. Though as she told Time magazine, she has faced criticism at being a mother and a war photographer: “Everyone is having a field day judging what a horrible woman I am, what a bad mother I am. I find it fascinating that anyone feels like they have the right to tell me how to live my life.”

In the wake of the enormous success of another story about the tensions between battlefield and family, American Sniper, a film adaptation was always likely. Various players pitched for the chance to tell Addario’s story, including George Clooney and Argo producer Grant Heslov; Working Title, with Reese Witherspoon attached to star; Darren Aronofsky with Natalie Portman; and Wolf of Wall Street actor Margot Robbie. In the end it was the blue-chip combo of Steven Spielberg and Jennifer Lawrence who secured Warner Bros the deal. American Sniper producer Andrew Lazar is also attached.

The film will follow Spielberg’s film adaptation of Roald Dahl’s classic The BFG, which begins filming soon with Mark Rylance and newcomer Ruby Barnhill. Spielberg is also rumoured to be planning a fifth Indiana Jones film, but his latest work is St James Place, a spy thriller coming later this year starring Rylance alongside Tom Hanks.