It's been a long time coming in the form of tidbits of information that were never fully confirmed, but the loyal Shelby family can now fully rejoice as the Peaky Blinders movie is officially happening.
Netflix has greenlit a feature film starring Oscar winner Cillian Murphy in a return to the iconic role of Birmingham clan leader Tommy Shelby.
Tom Harper will direct the yet-untitled film. Harper is no stranger to Peaky Blinders, having directed the last half of the first season.
Production will begin later this year from a script by Peaky creator Steven Knight. The producers are Caryn Mandabach, Knight, Murphy and Guy Heeley. Executive producers are Harper, David Kosse, Jamie Glazebrook, Andrew Warren and David Mason. The feature film is made in collaboration with BBC Film.
Knight told Birmingham World in March that the film was going ahead with Murphy on board. Yet this is the first official confirmation with a green light from the studio.
Plot details and further casting are still being kept under wraps, although Knight has previously said the film will be set during World War II.
Today, Murphy, “It seems like Tommy Shelby wasn’t finished with me. … It is very gratifying to be recollaborating with Steven Knight and Tom Harper on the film version of Peaky Blinders. This is one for the fans.”
Said Harper, “When I first directed Peaky Blinders over 10 years ago, we didn’t know what the series would become, but we did know that there was something in the alchemy of the cast and the writing that felt explosive. Peaky has always been a story about family — and so it’s incredibly exciting to be reuniting with Steve and Cillian to bring the movie to audiences across the world on Netflix.”
Knight added: “I’m genuinely thrilled that this movie is about to happen. It will be an explosive chapter in the Peaky Blinders story. No holds barred. Full-on Peaky Blinders at war.”
A global phenomenon, Peaky Blinders aired on BBC Two in the UK in 2013. Netflix joined in 2014. The series made the jump from BBC Two to BBC One in 2019 after the fourth season won the BAFTA for Best Drama. The series ran for six seasons in total, culminating in 2022.
In that time, Murphy's Tommy has settled many scores, including killing his cousin Michael (Finn Cole), and rode off into the sunset on a white horse after handing over the reins of the family business to sister Ada (Sophie Rundle).
Before winning the Best Actor Oscar for Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer in March, the Murphy starred in and produced Small Things Like These, which opened this year's Berlin Film Festival. At the same time he launched his production company Big Things Films with Alan Moloney. He is currently shooting Steve, based on Max Porter's book Shy, which Murphy and Moloney are producing under Big Things for Netflix.
He also recently signed Blood Runs Coal, based on Mark A. Bradley's book about the murder of labor leader Joseph Yablonski, which Oppenheimer studio Universal pre-emptively acquired.