Combat Control

Extraction director Sam Hargrave has found a new movie to make.

He’ll direct Combat Control, a film about Afghanistan War soldier and Medal of Honor recipient John Chapman. And after working with one Marvel Cinematic Universe star in Extraction (Thor actor Chris Hemsworth), Hargrave will be working with another MCU alum this time around: Spider-Man: Far From Home actor Jake Gyllenhaal.

A new report from Deadline says MGM is in talks to acquire Combat Control, which tells the story of John Chapman, who was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor after his death for his bravery and heroism during a battle with Al-Qaeda forces on a snowy mountainside in Afghanistan. Gyllenhaal will star and executive produce, with Sam Hargrave directing. Formerly a Marvel Studios stuntman and second unit director, Hargrave broke out in a big way in 2019 when his debut feature directing effort, Extraction, became Netflix’s most-watched movie.

Here’s how the outlet describes the new film:

Combat Control will be based on the true story of Air Force CCT Chapman, who died in battle on March 4, 2002 in Afghanistan. Following his death, no one imagined it would take over a decade for the truth of what really happened on that snowy mountainside to emerge. Fifteen years later, Air Force Captain Cora Alexander is tasked with the nearly impossible job of investigating whether Chapman is a worthy recipient of the medal, despite no eyewitnesses to his actions and the top-secret world surrounding clandestine operations. Alexander has to uncover the truth, and in revealing Chapman’s sacrifice to the world, she forges her own path to self-forgiveness and personal redemption.

When Chapman was awarded the military’s highest award on August 22, 2018, the U.S. government allowed the release of his story, and that of the classified Combat Controllers, to the public, giving the world a  glimpse into the smallest, most secretive and most highly decorated unit in the U.S. military. The medal was the first awarded to a CCT in U.S. history and the first awarded to a member of the Air Force since Vietnam.

The search is on for an actress to play Cora Alexander. As for Gyllenhaal, he has experience with war films, having starred in Sam Mendes’s Jarhead. Michael Russell Gunn (The Newsroom, Black Sails, Designated Survivor, Billions) will write the script, which will be adapted from the New York Times bestselling book Alone at Dawn by Dan Schilling and Lori Chapman Longfritz. Schilling will serve as a military consultant on the movie.

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