Quentin Tarantino’s ‘The Hateful Eight’ Cast Announced

After much uncertainty about whether or not the film would happen, The Weinstein Company has now announced the cast for Quentin Tarantino’s post-Civil War Western, The Hateful Eight.

Big star names mentioned in the press release include Samuel L. Jackson, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Kurt Russell, Tim Roth, Demian Bichir, Walton Goggins, Michael Madsen and Bruce Dern. In addition, The Weinstein Company confirmed the rumors that Magic Mike actor Channing Tatum will be joining the cast, however not as part of the “eight.”

The film has a rocky history all starting back in January when the script was disclosed online, creating a “very, very depressed” Tarantino with “no desire” to make the film. After a legal battle with Gawker over the leak, he subsequently declared that the western would not be his next film. However, at San Diego Comic-Con this past July, Tarantino assured fans that he would be making the film after all.

Along with the cast, the film’s plot was revealed in the press release, courtesy of The Weinstein Company:

In THE HATEFUL EIGHT, set six or eight or twelve years after the Civil War, a stagecoach hurtles through the wintry Wyoming landscape. The passengers, bounty hunter John Ruth (Russell) and his fugitive Daisy Domergue (Leigh), race towards the town of Red Rock where Ruth, known in these parts as “The Hangman,” will bring Domergue to justice. Along the road, they encounter two strangers: Major Marquis Warren (Jackson), a black former union soldier turned infamous bounty hunter, and Chris Mannix (Goggins), a southern renegade who claims to be the town’s new Sheriff. Losing their lead on the blizzard, Ruth, Domergue, Warren and Mannix seek refuge at Minnie’s Haberdashery, a stagecoach stopover on a mountain pass. When they arrive at Minnie’s, they are greeted not by the proprietor but by four unfamiliar faces. Bob (Bichir), who’s taking care of Minnie’s while she’s visiting her mother, is holed up with Oswaldo Mobray (Roth), the hangman of Red Rock, cow-puncher Joe Gage (Madsen), and Confederate General Sanford Smithers (Dern). As the storm overtakes the mountainside stopover, our eight travelers come to learn they may not make it to Red Rock after all…

The Hateful Eight will begin filming in January, with an expected fall 2015 debut. It will have the widest 70-mm film release in more than 20 years.