Filming To Begin On Craig Gillespie’s THE FINEST HOURS – Stars Chris Pine & Casey Affleck

Production is scheduled to begin in September on THE FINEST HOURS, starring Chris Pine (“Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit,” “Star Trek”), Academy Award and Golden Globe nominee Casey Affleck (“The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford,” “Ocean’s Thirteen”) and Holliday Grainger (“Cinderella,” “Bonnie & Clyde”).

The thriller, which will be directed by Craig Gillespie (“Million Dollar Arm,” “Lars and the Real Girl”), will shoot on location in Quincy and Chatham, Massachusetts.

In February of 1952, one of the worst storms to ever hit the East Coast struck New England, damaging an oil tanker off the coast of Cape Cod and literally ripping it in half. On a small lifeboat faced with frigid temperatures and 70-foot high waves, four members of the Coast Guard set out to rescue the more than 30 stranded sailors trapped aboard the rapidly-sinking vessel.

“The Finest Hours” is the story of their heroic mission, which is still considered the greatest small boat rescue in Coast Guard history.

The film is produced by Jim Whitaker (“Cinderella Man”) and Dorothy Aufiero (“The Fighter”). The screenplay is by Academy Award nominees Paul Tamsay & Eric Johnson (“The Fighter”) and Academy Award nominee Scott Silver (“The Fighter,” “8 Mile”) based on the book by Casey Sherman and Michael J. Tougias.

THE FINEST HOURS will be released in the U.S. in Fall, 2015.

“We are thrilled to be able to film ‘The Finest Hours’ on location in Massachusetts, and are grateful to the Massachusetts Film Office for all their support,” says Aufiero.