It was only a few weeks ago that news came of Spielberg having finally picked his next project. Naturally it wasn’t any of the films that had been previously rumored, but rather a WWI-era drama about an underage boy joining the army to rescue his beloved horse, which has ended up in Germany, pulling an ambulance-cart. As you might expect, the story sweeps across the battlegrounds of Europe, casting a wide lens on the first great war. Entitled War Horse, it is based off the theatrical adaptation of a Michael Morpugo novel.

Spielberg has settled on a lead to venture off on the non-horse half of that journey, 28-year-old Eddie Redmayne, according to the The Playlist. Redmayne is not a name that may jump out at you, but he’s had roles in a number of serious projects including Savage Grace, The Yellow Handkerchief, and Elizabeth: The Golden Age. I wish I could tell you how he was in The Other Boleyn Girl, but I kept black out during the film- I’ll assume he was amazing. I do remember Redmayne well as Matt Damon’s character’s son in The Good Shepherd, a role in which he shined.

Redmayne is certainly a boyish looking 28 year old, but I’m still interested to see how the film accommodates him as an underage solider in a war where boys half his age were often running off to defend the King in armies that didn’t demand proof-of-age.

War Horse is set to be released a mere four months before Tintin, on August 10th, 2011.