Russell Crowe has been officially set as Noah in Darren Aronofsky’s huge budgeted religious epic, says Deadline.com.

Both Christian Bale and Michael Fassbender had also been heavily linked with the film, which has been in pre-production for the best part of a year. Crowe seems most at home when playing similar "alpha" roles and the Kiwi can also grow a damn mean beard - so perfect casting this is. In fairness it has been proven before that both Bale and Fassbender are also capable of impressive facial hair. Spielberg is also getting on the biblical bandwagon (that sounds like a mobile church) with his Moses epic.

Here's hoping Aronofsky did his research into shooting films in vast amounts of water. Someone call Kevin Costner for what not to do and James Cameron for what to do.