The acclaimed Australian film-maker Phillip Noyce is being paid by the Saudi regime to make a feature film portraying the repressive state’s narcotics officers as heroes.

The Watchful Eyes, based on a real Saudi ministry of interior narcotics case, is billed as a dramatic depiction of the “heroism of security men in combating drugs”.

Saudi authorities executed 356 people last year, including 243 for drug-related cases, and analysts say an increase in the kingdom’s execution rate is largely due to its “war on drugs”.

Noyce has enjoyed a decades-long career with directing credits including the 1970s classic Newsfront, Dead Calm, Rabbit-Proof Fence, Patriot Games, Clear and Present Danger and The Bone Collector.

Filming for The Watchful Eyes began in Saudi Arabia in December and it will be released this year.

The Saudi Gazette news site reported: “The film will be shot entirely in the Kingdom and is expected to deliver a compelling artistic experience that highlights the heroism of Saudi security forces and introduces their efforts in combating crime to audiences around the world.”

Noyce, 76, has been escorted around filming locations and prisons by Turki al-Sheikh, a royal adviser dogged by allegations of human rights violations, including the detention of people who criticise him on social media.

Al-Sheikh, the chair of the country’s General Entertainment Authority, is known internationally for spearheading the Saudi bid to dominate world boxing and kickstarting moves to increase its influence on international football.

A close confidant of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Al-Sheikh has posted multiple photos and videos of “the great director Phillip Noyce”, saying The Watchful Eyes is a feature “inspired by a true story taken from the case files of Saudi Arabia’s drug enforcement officers”.

Noyce said he had accepted the job “for the challenge of working outside my comfort zone” and for the opportunity “to investigate a previously closed society” but did not address specific questions about the ethics of making a film paid for by the Saudi regime.

Joey Shea, a Saudi Arabia senior researcher for Human Rights Watch, said the Saudi government used its huge investments in sport and entertainment as part of a strategy to whitewash its human rights record.

“Given the subject matter of this film from what’s publicly available, combined with the reality of the rights abuses that have been so inextricably linked with this new war on drugs by the Saudi government, it’s really, really disturbing the role that these narratives may play in covering up the reality of these executions that have just been served the last few years,” Shea said.

The Watchful Eyes is described by officials as a “massive production” and a “grand Saudi epic”.

Noyce said the film was financed and produced by a Saudi entertainment company, Sela, which is backed by the Public Investment Fund, Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, to produce content to boost the local film industry.

The regime aims to make the country a leading global production destination as part of Prince Mohammed’s Vision 2030 plan for economic diversification to reduce reliance on the oil industry.

Noyce described The Watchful Eyes as “a low-budget kidnapping thriller”.

“Gritty and raw and shot entirely in Arabic, I don’t think the movie will attract any tourists to Saudi Arabia,” he said.

Asked about the country’s human rights record and executions for drug offences, Noyce said: “I guess the story could be edited to send an anti-drug message, but the story I shot was told from the highly emotional point of view of the lead detective in the hunt for a missing child.

“Surprisingly, Sela never once interfered from a creative point of view.”

In March the BBC was accused of making “glossy propaganda films” after its commercial arm teamed up with the Saudis.

Jeed Basyouni, head of Middle East and North Africa (MENA) death penalty projects for Reprieve, said the number of executions in Saudi Arabia continued to grow while officials sold a false vision of the kingdom.

“It is essential that the world sees this rebranding for what it is – a flimsy attempt to disguise brutal abuses of human rights,” she said.

“The purpose of culture-washing is to legitimise the human rights abuses carried out by the Saudi regime, using the arts, comedy and film to portray a tolerant government when in reality, anyone who offends the men in power risks winding up dead.”

The Public Investment Fund has backed the LIV Golf Tour to the tune of more than $5bn since 2021 but funding will cease at the end of the year, in part because of the conflict in the Middle East.