As Dads Army's popular character Sergeant Wilson might say to his bumbling superior, Captain Mainwaring:

"Do you think that's wise, sir?"

But wise or not, actors Bill Nighy and Toby Jones are to star in a new film version of the BBC's much-loved 70s sitcom Dad's Army, the story of the Walmington-on-Sea Home Guard during the Second World War.

Nighy will take the role of Wilson, originally played by John Le Mesurier, and Jones, best-known for playing Truman Capote in the film Infamous and Alfred ­Hitchcock in the TV drama The Girl, is to be cast as Captain Mainwaring, a role indelibly associated with Arthur Lowe.

Further casting has yet to be announced so it's not yet known who will play the Scottish undertaker Private Fraser, made famous by Dumfries actor John Laurie, whose catchphrase "We're doomed. Doomed," was regularly heard in schoolyards throughout the 1970s.

Dad's Army was the creation of Jimmy Perry, who had himself served in the Home Guard, and the late David Croft, and was first broadcast in black and white in 1968. At its peak attracted 18 million viewers.

Perry, now 90, will be a producer on the film along with Damian Jones, whose previous films include the Margaret Thatcher biopic, The Iron Lady.

The series made a number of veteran actors famous, including Laurie and Arnold Ridley, who played Private Godfrey.