In what seems like a bizarre Inception-style twist on how we perceive reality, pop-auteur director Christopher Nolan has cast pop star (and acting novice) Harry Styles to not only be in his next film, but to star in it.

Titled Dunkirk, Styles will be joining a cast of previously-announced heavyweights: Nolan-vet Tom Hardy, Kenneth Branagh, and recent Oscar-winner Mark Rylance. An initial look at that lineup led most to assume Hardy would be the top lead, but with the casting of Styles – who until now has built a career on boy band pop as lead singer of One Direction, bolstered by the obsessed devotion of teen girls worldwide – The Hollywood Reporter is clarifying that he will indeed star in Dunkirk, set during World War II, along with fellow newcomer, actress Fionn Whitehead.

Dunkirk will dramatize the 1940 British military evacuation of that French city. The action-thriller will be shot on a combination of Imax 65mm and 65mm large format film, and at locations where many of this evacuation’s real-life events took place.

Scheduled to begin shooting in May, Dunkirk will hit theaters next summer, July 21, 2017.