Martin Scorsese is to lend his name to the hugely ambitious new production by Russian auteur Aleksandr Sokurov.

Scorsese will "present" Sokurov's Waterloo, a film which will concentrate on Napoleon. The picture is set to be Sokurov's third film in his tetralogy about men in power, after Taurus (which focused on Lenin) and Moloch (Adolf Hitler).

Principal photography will take place on a single day - Sunday Dec 17 - in and around Moscow's sprawling Hermitage museum. It will be made using digital technology and presented as a single take. The production will be a logistical mindbender. Although the action will involve over 1,000 actors, rehearsal will be minimal as the production will only be able to use the museum on Sundays, when it is closed to the public.

Although financing is not yet completed, like Moloch, Waterloo is likely to be set up as a German-Russian co-production. Moloch was produced by Russia's Lenfilm and Goskino and Germany's Zero Film with additional backing from Bennetton film investment arm Fabrica Cinema.

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