Hanks scoops starring role in Da Vinci Code film

Tom Hanks is set to star in a film version of best-selling novel 'The Da Vinci Code'.

The Oscar-winning actor has beaten off stiff competition from Russell Crowe, Hugh Jackman and George Clooney to win the coveted role of heroic Harvard professor Robert Langdon in the movie adaptation of Dan Brown's cult thriller.

Director Ron Howard, who worked with Tom Hanks on 'Apollo 13', is now looking for a French actress to play cryptologist Sophie Neveu, who assists Langdon when he is called in to help solve the murder of a top curator at The Louvre in Paris.

Filming is due to start in Paris, where the story begins, next Spring, before the cast and crew move to London and Scotland.