Oliver Stone's ‘Edward Snowden’ Movie to be Ready for Christmas Release

Open Road Films on Friday announced that Oscar-winning director Oliver Stone's Edward Snowden biopic flick will be released on December 25. Stone is directing from a screenplay he co-wrote with Kieran Fitzgerald based on two books, The Snowden Files: The Inside Story of the World's Most Wanted Man, by journalist Luke Harding, and the novel Time of the Octopus by Snowden's Russian lawyer Antoly Kucherena according to The Hollywood Reporter. The film is reportedly being produced by Stone's longtime partner Moritz Borman as well as Eric Kopeloff and Philip Schulz-Deyle.

The real Edward Joseph "Ed" Snowden, 31, is an American computer professional who leaked classified information from the National Security Agency (NSA) to the mainstream media beginning June 2013. The leaked documents revealed numerous global surveillance programs, many of which are run by the NSA with the cooperation of telecommunication companies and European governments. Snowden has been variously called a hero, a whistleblower, a dissident, a patriot, and a traitor. He currently lives in Russia after he was granted a three-year residency permit. He is nevertheless still seeking asylum in the European Union.

Edward Snowden will star Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the title role. Shailene Woodley, Melissa Leo, Zachary Quinto and Tom Wilkinson will also star in the film. According to Dark Horizons, Timothy Olyphant, Rhys Ifans and Joely Richardson have also joined the cast. Olyphant will reportedly play a CIA agent who befriended Snowden before the latter fled to Russia seeking asylum after making public more classified documents than anyone since Daniel Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers during the Vietnam War, wrote Deadline.

Snowden's exploits were also covered in the documentary film Citizenfour by director Laura Poitras, which was released last year and is a favorite to win the best documentary Oscar award on Sunday. In January 2013, Poitras received an encrypted e-mail offering her inside information about illegal wiretapping practices of the NSA and other intelligence agencies from someone who called himself Citizen Four, who she later learned was Snowden.