Your first official look at Christian Bale in Scott Cooper’s upcoming western Hostiles has arrived. Cooper, director of Out of the Furnace and Black Mass starring Johnny Depp, returns to the world of period pieces, this time in the old west. Hostiles is set in the year 1892 and tells the story of a legendary Army

Captain who reluctantly agrees to escort a dying Cheyenne war chief and his family back to their homeland. The former rivals encounter a young widow along the way and together, they must overcome a punishing journey full of hostile and vicious outliers.

With Christian Bale in the lead role as the “legendary Army Captain” and Scott Cooper in the director’s chair, who proved with Black Mass (while it has its flaws) that he could tell quite a compelling story in the past, Hostiles sounds like it could mean some serious business. I also appreciate the fact that Cooper has yet to return to the same well, as this will be his first time under the western genre, a genre that seems very fitting for his directing style.

Alongside Bale will be Wes Studi, Academy Award nominee Rosamund Pike, Ben Foster, Adam Beach, Jesse Plemons, and Q’orianka Kilcher. How’s that for a cast? The film is set to premiere at Toronto International Film Festival next month, where it will look for a buyer who will hopefully give it a release date much sooner rather than later. How does Hostiles sound to you? What about the cast? Will you go out of your way to see it?