F Michael Pitt To Star Opposite Scarlett Johansson In Ghost in the Shell | Galactic News One

Michael Pitt To Star Opposite Scarlett Johansson In Ghost in the Shell


Eclectic actor Michael Pitt has joined Rupert Sander's upcoming big screen take on Masamune Shirow's iconic sci-fi manga, Ghost in the Shell.

The Boardwalk Empire star will play the antagonist to Scarlett Johansson's hero in the film. Known as The Laughing Man, the villain is a "bitter and vengeful man with body that is part robot. He has a unique sense of style and has been described as a bad guy filtered through the lens of a street artist."

The Laughing Man isn't the iconic villain from the late '80s early '90s manga and mid-90s movie (that one was called The Puppet Master), but rather a villain from the 2000s anime series Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex.

The character is a cyber-terrorist (this is Ghost in the Shell after all), with an obsession with J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. In fact, his name, The Laughing Man, was taken from a short story of the same name Salinger published in 1949 on The New Yorker.

In the upcoming film, Johansson plays Major Motoko Kusanagi, the squad leader of an intelligence organization called Public Security Section 9, which deals in cyber-terrorism and cyber-warfare, and that is tasked with The Laughing Man case. It's members are among the best in the country (Japan), and they are allowed to act with little to no governmental oversight.

Pilou Asbæk who worked with Johansson on Luc Besson's Lucy will play Batou, the team's heavy hitter. Maleficent's actor Sam Riley was reported to be in talks to play The Laughing Man, but now that Pitt got the role, it's unclear if the negotiations broke down or if he is actually up for another role.

Ghost in the Shell is expected to go into production later this month in New Zealand for a March 31, 2017 release.
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