Clint Eastwood has selected Ryan Phillippe, Jesse Bradford and Adam Beach to star in his next project, about the raising of the flag on Iwo Jima.

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Eastwood is directing "Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima," based on the book by James Bradley, who learned only after his father's death that he had been one of the six U.S. Marines in one of the most celebrated photographs of World War II, Zap2it.com reports. Steven Spielberg is involved as a producer.

Beach, a member of Canada's Ojibwa tribe who played a Navajo code talker in "Windtalkers," has been cast as Ira Hayes, the Pima Indian who died of exposure less than a decade after he became a national hero. Bradford, a young movie veteran who also had a recurring role on "The West Wing" in 2003 and 2004 is to play Rene Gagnon, another of the flag-raisers.

Phillipe is to play John Bradley.

Paul Haggis, who wrote the screenplay for Eastwood's "Million-Dollar Baby," is doing the same for "Flags."