1st trailer and clip from Julian Assange drama 'Underground'

When we learned last month that Anthony LaPaglia had jetted Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained, it caused quite a stir because of his claims of how uncontrollable the production had become. The many problems had jammed up his schedule, and threatened his availability to shoot Underground, a film centered on the early life of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. The Australian telefilm is being directed by close friend, Robert Connolly, and the financing was largely built around LaPaglia's presence, so he did the honorable thing and left Tarantino's more high-profile gig.

With Underground now set to premier tomorrow in Toronto, the first trailer has been released, and it looks like LaPaglia may have made the right choice because it looks great. The film is based on Suelette Dreyfus' 1997 novel, Underground: Tales of Hacking, Madness and Obsession on the Electronic Frontier, and takes a look at a younger Assange in 1989 when he was still discovering the power he held as a renowned computer hacker. Newcomer Alex Williams will play Assange, with LaPaglia as a detective named Ken who's been tracking him. Along with it comes a new clip in which Assange rather brazenly hacks Ken's ancient computer(it's the 80s!) and proceeds to inform him of his plans. It's just a small glimpse at the global information hound that Assange would become later in life.

Underground also stars Rachel Griffiths, Callan McAuliffe, and Laura Wheelwright. NBCUniversal holds the rights and will distribute the film worldwide soon....[NBCUniversal/Indiewire]