Slavery backdrop for new Tarantino film

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HOLLYWOOD, April 14 (UPI) -- Director Quentin Tarantino has an all-star cast lined up for his new picture "Django Unchained," an adventure set in the pre-Civil War slavery system.

Jamie Foxx, Leonardo DiCaprio and Christoph Waltz will share top billing in the film, slated for release the day after Christmas.

A synopsis of the film was released Friday by Sony Pictures and the Weinstein Company outlining the plot, The Hollywood Reporter said.

The tale features Foxx in the title role of Django, a slave who becomes the increasingly effective right-hand man of Waltz, a bounty hunter who tracks down wanted criminals in Antebellum Dixie.

The plot takes the pair to a brutal plantation owned by DiCaprio where Django has the opportunity to rescue his wife, played by Kerry Washington, who was sold in the slave trade years before.

Also in cast are Samuel L. Jackson and Kurt Russell.