Angelina Jolie-Pitt is the latest star to join the Netflix bandwagon, and she's not only turning to the streaming site for her new movie, she's also stringing her son, Maddox, along for the project.
The award-winning actress and philanthropist will be working behind the camera as a director for Netflix's "First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers," a drama based on the memoirs written by Cambodia's Loung Ung, according to InStyle. This news comes after her first directorial job, "Unbroken," received good reviews and has even earned Oscar nominations.
"First They Killed My Father" will touch on the Khmer Rouge's rise to power in 1975. The organization ruled Cambodia for four grueling years and orchestrated the Cambodian genocide. Only five years old and forced to leave her family, Loung became a child soldier during those years while the rest of her siblings were sent to labor camps.
According to a press statement released via PR Newswire, the actress read Loung's memoir 10 years ago and became friends with each other. Together, they decided to turn the book into a movie.
"Through the years, we have become close friends, and my admiration for Angelina as a woman, a mother, a filmmaker, and a humanitarian has only grown. It is with great honor that I entrust my family's story to Angelina to adapt into a film," said Loung in the press release.
"I was deeply affected by Loung's book," said Angelina, also in the statement. "It deepened forever my understanding of how children experience war and are affected by the emotional memory of it. And it helped me draw closer still to the people of Cambodia, my son's homeland."
The son she is speaking about is Maddox, 13, whom the actress adopted from the said country in 2002 as a single mother.
With this movie project, Maddox will also be part of the film. But while his actual role has not been confirmed, the teenager will not be a stranger to the movie set. Us Weekly reported that Maddox was a production assistant for "By the Sea." The film is the big-screen reunion for both Angelina and her husband, Brad Pitt, according to CNN.
The actress further said in the press release that she understands the nature and tone of "First They Killed My Father," but says that it is "important to see." "They are also hard to get made. Netflix is making this possible, and I am looking forward to working with them and excited that the film will reach so many people."
