Sony Pictures Classics has acquired the North American rights to James Vanderbilt’s Second World War thriller Nuremberg.

The historical drama stars Russell Crowe as German war criminal Hermann Goring and Rami Malek as Douglas Kelley, the American Army psychiatrist who interviewed Hitler’s right-hand man in jail after World War II ended. The acquisition reunites SPC with Vanderbilt after the specialty distributor in 2015 released the director’s Truth, a film about the Rathergate scandal.

SPC plans a theatrical release of Nuremberg on Nov. 7, 2025, timed around the 80th anniversary of the Nuremberg trials by the Allies to try top defeated Nazi leaders. Nuremberg centers on psychiatrist Kelley weighing whether the Nazi prisoners are fit to stand trial for their war crimes, only to enter into a battle of wits with Goring.

The historical drama from Walden Media and Bluestone Entertainment was written and directed by Vanderbilt and is based on the book The Nazi and the Psychiatrist, by writer Jack El-Hai. Nuremberg also stars Michael Shannon, Richard E. Grant, Leo Woodall, John Slattery, Mark O’Brien, Colin Hanks, Lydia Peckham, Wrenn Schmidt, Lotte Verbeek and Andreas Pietschmann.

Nuremberg is produced by Richard Saperstein, Bradley J. Fischer, Vanderbilt, William Sherak, Frank Smith, Benjamin Tappan, Cherilyn Hawrysh, István Major and George Freeman. The executive producer credits are shared by El-Hai, Brooke Saperstein, Annie Saperstein, Beau Turpin, W. Porter Payne Jr., Paul Neinstein, Széchenyi Funds Géza Deme and Tamas Hajnal.   

“I am beyond thrilled to be reuniting with Michael and Tom and the whole Sony Pictures Classics team, who 10 years ago took a chance on me as a first-time director, and whose legacy of championing great films makes them an incredible partner,” Vanderbilt said in a statement.

SPC added in its own statement: “Written and directed by James Vanderbilt, Nuremberg is a major work, a riveting subject, even more relevant today, that will speak to audiences of all ages. Russell Crowe, Michael Shannon, Rami Malek and Leo Woodall are all at their career best here. Nuremberg will be a standout in theaters this fall.”

Vanderbilt also wrote Zodiac for David Fincher and he has written and produced over 20 films. Nuremberg is financed by Bluestone Entertainment, Walden Media and Széchenyi Funds of Hungary. Mythology Entertainment developed the project after acquiring the rights to El-Hai’s original article and then book in 2011.

WME Independent represented the worldwide rights to the film and negotiated the deal with SPC on behalf of the filmmakers.