The first trailer for director Niki Caro’s fact-based World War II-era drama “The Zookeeper’s Wife” shows Jessica Chastain as the title character working to hide Jews from the Nazis after her family’s zoo has been heavily bombed.
The two-time Oscar-nominated actress plays real-life war hero Antonina Żabińska, who ran the Warsaw Zoo with her husband, Dr. Jan Żabiński (Johan Heldenbergh of “The Broken Circle Breakdown”).
When Poland is invaded by the Nazis in 1939, Jan and Antonina are stunned — and forced to report to the Reich’s newly appointed chief zoologist, Lutz Heck (Daniel Brühl of “Captain America: Civil War”).
To fight back on their own terms, Antonina and Jan covertly begin working with the Resistance — and put into action plans to save lives of Jews who were first forced into and then forcibly removed from the Warsaw Ghetto, with Antonina putting herself and even her children at great risk.
The script is by Angela Workman, based on the nonfiction best-seller by Diane Ackerman.
Chastain, who appeared in last summer’s “The Huntsman: Winter’s War,” is due to return to theaters later this month as a high-powered lobbyist in John Madden’s thriller “Miss Sloane.”
Focus Features plans to release “The Zookeeper’s Wife” in theaters on March 31, 2017
Watch the trailer above.