Kevin Bacon cast in Amazon thriller Jungle

The Footloose star is teaming up with Greg McLean for the survival movie

Kevin Bacon has been cast in dramatic survival thriller Jungle, based on the real life story of adventurer Yossi Ghinsberg.

The US actor, known for Footloose, Apollo 13 and Mystic River, is joining forces once again with Wolf Creek director Greg McLean.

The story follows the life of Ghinsberg, who found himself lost for three terrifying weeks in the Amazon rainforest in 1981. He miraculously survived to write a bestselling memoir that inspired Discovery Channel docu-drama I Shouldn’t Be Alive.

It is not known which character Bacon will play, but Deadline reports that he has been cast as Ghinsberg’s “complex, dangerous and alluring” Austrian guide, Karl.

Justin Monjo is adapting Jungle’s script from Ghinsberg’s 2005 book of the same name, with shooting scheduled to begin early next year in Australia and Colombia.

Screen Australia is financing Jungle – one of 11 projects to receive $9.2 million from the agency along with a Peter Allen biopic and a new TV series with Guy Pearce.

Bacon and McLean worked together previously on scary movie 6 Miranda Drive, due for release next year.

Bacon will next be seen starring alongside Benedict Cumberbatch and Johnny Depp in hotly-anticipated mob drama Black Mass.