Rising young stars CillianMurphy and Natalie Press are to star in Telepathy, a new sci-fi feature just announced on Beyond'sCannes slate.

Miranda Richardson and SamNeill are also in the cast. The project, due to shoot in October 2006, is scriptedby Stephen Volk and is to be directed by Lesley Manning (whose credits includehighly praised BBC TV films My Sister's Wife and Ghostwatch.)

Telepathy tells the story of Josef and Viktor Zalenski,estranged identical twin brothers who are chosen by the Russian Government asthe subjects of a top-secret experiment to test the powers of telepathy as aviable form of communication between earth and outer space.

Telepathy will be produced by the UK's Andrew Curtis (Minotaur,Lost In La Mancha) and Laurence Borg(Mrs Henderson Presents, Sense and Sensibility) with Sean Gascoine executive producing.

'The highly originalnature of the story attracted us to the project and with the strong cast thatLesley Manning has assembled, we are very excited and confident that Telepathy will be extremely successful in the internationalmarketplace,' commented Beyond Films' head of sales and acquisitions HilaryDavis.