Harry Melling joins Christian Bale in Netflix film

Harry Potter star Harry Melling is going to play one of the world’s most famous authors in a new Netflix movie.

Melling has been cast by Netflix as horror writer Edgar Allan Poe in an adaptation of Louis Bayard’s novel The Pale Blue Eye, according to Deadline.

The film is not actually a biopic about Poe, instead it’s a murder mystery story that imagines the would-be writer swept up in an investigation at the US Military Academy at West Point.

The Pale Blue Eye also stars Thor: Love and Thunder’s Christian Bale as an experienced detective teaming up with young cadet Poe to solve a string of murders taking place in 1830.

The grim details of these cases would go on to inspire Poe’s career as one of the most famous horror writers in history.

Scott Cooper has signed on to write and direct The Pale Blue Eye, in a reteaming with his Out of the Furnace and Hostiles actor Bale.

Cooper wrote and directed the Academy Award-nominated Jeff Bridges musical drama Crazy Heart, as well as this year’s upcoming horror movie Antlers.

Melling is best known for playing Dudley Dursley in the Harry Potter series, and recently had a key role as Anya Taylor-Joy’s rival chess player in Netflix’s The Queen’s Gambit.

The 32-year-old actor previously worked with Netflix in The Devil All The Time, in which he played a sadistic evangelical preacher. He is next set to play the Shakespearean character Malcolm in Joel Coen’s adaptation of Macbeth for Apple TV+, alongside Denzel Washington and Frances McDormand.