Stuart Beattie, co-writer of Australia, will make his directorial debut with an adaptation of the young-adult SF novel Tomorrow, When the War Began, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Beattie also wrote the screenplay.

Tomorrow is the first novel in a popular series of seven written by Australian John Marsden and published 1994-99. The Tomorrow Series, as it is known, details the insurgency efforts of a band of Aussie teenagers fighting off an enemy invasion and occupation of their homeland.

Beattie is casting and crewing up for a September shoot Down Under. Sydney-based Omnilab Media (Dead of Night) is financing and will handle the sizable visual effects through its company Iloura.

The filmmakers plan to make a trilogy of features from the first three books and then, if they're successful, spin the next four off into a TV series.