The lead character of Irvine Welsh's Filth sounds like a dream job for any actor. Bruce Robertson is a Scottish cop and misanthrope who is addicted to sex and drugs and would rather spend his days pranking his fellow police offers than doing his job. It's nothing you wouldn't expect from the author of Trainspotting, but what performer wouldn't want to try their hand at playing someone like that? In that sense, James McAvoy has just won the lottery.

The Playlist has received confirmation from Welsh himself that casting has begun for an adaptation of Filth and McAvoy has landed the lead role. What's more, Jamie Bell and Alan Cumming have both come on-board as well, starring as Ray Lennox (Robertson's partner) and Chief Inspector Bob Toal (Roberton's boss), respectively. The project is being directed by Jon S. Baird, who only has one feature credit to his name, but it impressed Welsh to the point that he knew he wanted the filmmaker on board. "Jon did a biopic of Cass Pennant, a film called Cass, which was well received in the U.K," Welsh said. "It was compared favourably by some of the critics to This Is England. It was the same kind of style and really kind of a beautiful little film."

Baird as also done a rewrite on the script, which Welsh called "absolutely brilliant." The project is scheduled to start production in January 2012. Given the three actors that have already been wrangled, this could definitely turn out to be a project to look out for.