Actor Daniel Gimenez Cacho (pictured) looks set to take the third lead role in Pedro Almodovar's forthcoming Bad Education (La Mala Educacion) alongside Mexico's Gael Garcia Bernal and Spaniard Fele Martinez.

According to reports in both the Mexican and Spanish press, Gimenez Cacho will play a priest who re-encounters a former student whom he had sexually abused, played as an adult by Garcia Bernal (Y Tu Mama Tambien).

Martinez, the shrunken man in the silent film-within-a-film of Almodovar's best original script Oscar winner Talk To Her (Hable Con Ella), is set to co-star.

The film, which the director has described as film noir, is expected to shoot for 12 to 14 weeks in Spain starting in May on an estimated $8m budget. Pathe has taken rights in the UK, France, Benelux and Switzerland, with Focus International handling sales in all other territories.

Almodovar's Madrid-based production house El Deseo declined to confirm the casting of Gimenez Cacho, who is quoted in various newspaper reports confirming his participation.

The Spanish-born, Mexico-based Gimenez Cacho recently starred in Aro Tolbukhin: In The Mind Of An Assassin, a Spanish/Mexican co-production nominated for 13 of Mexico's Oscar equivalent Ariel awards including best actor.