Film company Attractive Films is hoping to have its J.R.R. Tolkien biopic in theaters before Chernin Entertainment can do the same. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the $18 million feature will pivot around the author's relationship with C.S. Lewis, whom Tolkien helped re-introduce to Christianity some years after Lewis had become an atheist at the age of 15. Set largely in the beginning of World War II, Tolkien and Lewis will also touch on the darker aspects of the writers' complex and turbulent friendship.

Its theological undercurrents make Tolkien and Lewis a stark contrast to Chernin Entertainment's Tolkien, which looks at a vastly different period in the author's life. The latter explores the World War I veteran's time in Oxford University's Pembroke College, his military service, and how these experiences would later influence his literary work. Attractive Films is pushing for an Easter release in hopes of courting the "faith-based audience." Tolkien and Lewis will be directed by The Expendables 2's Simon West, and produced by Mark Joseph, Mark Cooper, Jib Polhemus, and Charles Moore.

Correction: This article originally stated that C.S. Lewis helped convert Tolkien to Christianity. Tolkien was the one who eventually influenced Lewis to embrace Christianity.