Tim Blake Nelson has boarded Everybody Loves Whales, a Working Title project for Universal that stars John Krasinski and Drew Barrymore.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the film is set in Cold War-era 1988, and tells the true story of a small-town news reporter (Krasinski) and a Greenpeace volunteer (Barrymore) who enlist the help of rival superpowers to save three majestic gray whales trapped under the ice of the Arctic Circle.

Ken Kwapis is attached to direct Everybody Loves Whales, which is based on Tom Rose's nonfiction book "Freeing the Whales: How the Media Created the World's Greatest Non-Event."

Nelson will play a wildlife expert who works in the wildlife-management office.

Kristen Bell also is in the cast of the movie, which shoots in the fall.