The Dutch photographer Corbijn – best known for the Ian Curtis biopic Control and Italy-set thriller The American – will direct a cast led by Philip Seymour Hoffman, Rachel McAdams, Willem Dafoe and Robin Wright.

A Most Wanted Man follows a half-Chechen, half-Russian immigrant – performed by rising Russian star Grigory Dobrygin – who appears in Hamburg’s Islamic community laying claim to his father’s criminal fortune. As it becomes clear he has been tortured, German and US security agencies must ascertain the man’s identity, and whether he signals an unknown terrorist threat.

British author le Carré – who has authored 23 books – came to know Hamburg when he was posted there admist the Cold War as a political consul while working for the British government in the early 1960s.

He returned there recently to research and write A Most Wanted Man. Eight of his novels have so far been adapted for film, including Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Constant Gardener, The Russia House and The Spy Who Came In From The Cold.

Adapted for the screen by Australian writer Andrew Bovell, the creative team behind A Most Wanted Man includes director of photography Benoît Delhomme – known for his work on John Hillcoat’s recent Lawless  – and editor Claire Simpson, whose credits include The Constant Gardener.

The film is produced by Gail Egan and Andrea Calderwood for Potboiler, and Stephen Cornwell and Simon Cornwell for The Ink Factory, and Malte Grunert for Amusement Park.

John le Carré is afforded an Executive Producer credit along with Tessa Ross of Film4. FilmNation are handling international sales.

The film is supported by production funding from the FilmFörderung Hamburg Schleswig Holstein, Medienboard Berlin Brandenburg and the DFFF.