Most people will know her as a model but Agyness Deyn is now trying out her acting skills after being cast in a big-screen adaptation of the British novel Sunset Song.

The film, which is being produced by my former employers Hurricane Films, is based on the 1932 novel from Lewis Grassic Gibbon and focuses on a young female farmer in Scotland named Chris Guthrie (Deyn) who finds love before the start of World War I.

Deyn who recently received acclaim for her West End debut in The Leisure Society was quoted about her casting in Sunset Song:

“When I read the script I fell completely in love with the character and the story, I’m so honoured and excited to be working with Terence, he’s such an incredible director. I can’t wait to get started and just hope that I can do Chris Guthrie justice!”

News of the project was announced a couple of months ago by Hurricane. It was then confirmed today in Cannes that the international company Fortissimo Films had gained the international rights to help make it.

Terence Davies, who worked with Hurricane on the BAFTA-nominated documentary Of Time and the City in 2008, is involved again with directing duties while Scottish actor Peter Mullan (Tyrannosaur, War Horse) has also been cast in the film alongside Deyn.

Executive producer Bob Last revealed his anticipation for the film as well as the prospect of working with Davies again stating:

After The House of Mirth, I was determined to make another film with Terence. He is such a cinematic master, with a vision that is at one and the same time richly beautiful and austere. Lewis Grassic Gibbon’s intimate epic seemed perfectly suited; a powerful story of love and loss set against the onset of modernisation, a theme that continues to resonate in today’s rapidly-changing world. The opportunity to bring Peter Mullan and Agyness Deyn together with Terence and to work with the team that produced his Of Time and the City could not be missed.”

As someone who had the pleasure of working with Hurricane Films for a while, I can already see a lot of potential for this production especially from the hard-working team behind it.

Of course the casting of model-turned-actress Deyn is an intriguing one but with someone as experienced as Terence Davies helming the film, there should be no problem getting a solid performance out of her. Besides when it comes to models becoming actors it worked out well for the likes of Halle Berry and Cameron Diaz didn’t it?