Nicolas Cage is to star in Snowden.

The Ghost Rider star will play a former US intelligence official in Oliver Stone’s thriller about whistleblower Edward Snowden, reported Variety.

Edward Snowden
Edward Snowden (Charles Platiau/AP)

Joseph Gordon-Levitt will play the former US National Security Agency contractor who leaked classified information in 2013.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Matt Sayles/Invision)

He was charged in 2013 with two counts of violating the espionage act and theft of government property and he is currently in Moscow, Russia, where he has been granted temporary asylum.

Shailene Woodley, Zachary Quinto, Melissa Leo, Tom Wilkinson, Rhys Ifans, Joely Richardson and Timothy Olyphant will also appear in the film, which has started pre-production in Munich.

Oliver Stone
Oliver Stone (Ng Han Guan/AP)

Oliver has written the screenplay for Snowden, which is based on two books: Time Of The Octopus by Snowden’s Russian lawyer Anatoly Kucherena and Luke Harding’s The Snowden Files – The Inside Story Of The World’s Most Wanted Man.

The film will be released in the US and France in December.

Oliver’s version about Snowden’s story follows Laura Poitras’ non-fiction work Citizenfour, which won the best documentary Oscar.