Peter Strickland has signed on to helm The Duke of Burgundy, Screen Daily has reported.

Strickland, whose second film Berberian Sound Studio recently collected four British Independent Film Awards, will direct the dark melodrama for fellow filmmaker Ben Wheatley’s production company Rook Films.

The Duke of Burgundy, described by Strickland as “a simple love story about a devoted couple whose intimate needs are rarely in harmony”, centers on an amateur lepidopterist (Chiara D’Anna) whose wayward desires test the limits of her lover’s tolerance.

The film is due to shoot in early 2013, with much of the funding coming from the British Film Institute’s film fund, who – along with Film4, Warp X and Illuminations Films – helped fund Berberian Sound Studio.

In addition to The Duke of Burgundy, Rook Films’ slate includes Wheatley’s A Field in England, Sidharth Srinivasan’s The Penance and Jim Hosking’s Whitaker. Wheatley is also said to be working on a claymation film titled Mega Evil Motherfuckers!