Ridley Scott may have a busy schedule at the moment, having set up a number of movies as director including the sequel to Gladiator, but he is still finding time to join Margot Robbie in producing on a new movie Boston Strangler, which it has been revealed will star Keira Knightly as Loretta McLaughlin, the reporter who led a groundbreaking investigation into the infamous murderer. Coming from Disney's 20th Century Studios and set to begin shooting in Boston this December, the film is written and directed by Crown Heights creator Matt Ruskin.

Keira Knightley will be aiming for her third Academy Award nomination with the drama, which sees her play the reporter who was first to connect the series of assumed to be unrelated murders by the Boston Strangler. Reporting on the case with fellow journalist Jean Cole, Loretta McLaughlin ensured that the women in the area were aware of the danger that lurked in the area and despite sexism from their industry, they fought to keep local woman at the forefront of new developments in the case.

As well as making the connection with the murders, McLaughlin was also responsible for uncovering the corruption surrounding the identity of the Strangler, which gives the movie a double edge of being a conspiracy thriller and a murder mystery all in one. For those looking for an authentic story will find it here, as Ruskin actually contacted the families of both McLaughlin and Cole and had access to the research that the pair worked on during the case, so all in this is probably about as accurate an account of events as is possible.

There is currently no release date scheduled for the movie, but with shooting set to kick off in December, it is likely that the release will be around the end of 2022 or into early 2023.

Keira Knightly currently leads up Camille Griffin's directorial debut Silent Night, appearing alongside Matthew Goode, Roman Griffin Davis and Lily-Rose Depp in a story that looks like being a cheery little movie about a group of old friends celebrating the Christmas holidays with a get together...except there is a poison cloud that is going to kill everyone on Earth before the night is through. Bringing together a number of genres that usually wouldn't sit well together, combining a mildly sci-fi premise, with a statement about social order and class. The movie had its premiere at the Toronto Film Festival and will be released in theaters and streaming on AMC+ in December.

Ridley Scott will produce the movie while he works on his upcoming Napoleon Bonaparte historical drama Kitbag, before he begins work on his sequel to Gladiator. Scott has spoken of wanting to follow up the 1999 Oscar winning movie for some time, and he recently confirmed that he is now almost ready to return to that world. Scott still has two of his directorial efforts to come this year with the historical The Last Duel, and the biographical crime drama The House of Gucci, starring Lady Gaga, which arrives in theaters in November. This news arrives from Deadline.