Guillermo del Toro will direct the UK’s white hot Benedict Cumberbatch, Oscar nominee Jessica Chastain, Emma Stone and Charlie Hunnam in Legendary Pictures’ haunted house thriller.

Crimson Peak is scheduled to start shooting in February 2014 based on an original ghost story del Toro wrote with Matthew Robbins about a woman whose husband may not be what he seems.

del Toro and Robbins initially set up the project at Universal. Legendary will now produce and finance, while Universal retains an option to come on board as a financier at a later date.

del Toro, busy preparing his robots versus monsters mash-up Pacific Rim, which Legendary also backed and Warner Bros will open on Jul 12, is rewriting the screenplay with Lucinda Coxon.