Jodie Foster recently headed to Austin with her buzzed about “The Beaver” under her arm and the reviews were mixed. While some were taken with Mel Gibson‘s comeback performance, we found the film to be tonally inconsistent and a bit of a disappointment, particularly as the script placed on the Black List. But with the film set to hit theaters soon, Foster is ready to put the ‘Beaver’ behind her and move forward and it looks as if she’s planning a bit of a change in direction.
In an interview with Hero Complex, the actress/director revealed she’s currently writing a sci-fi thriller she hopes to direct. “There’s a family element to it, but it’s much more a genre movie,” Foster explained about the gestating film. “I’d like to do that ’cause that’s a world I live in as an actor but I’ve never really gone to as a director. I’d still have to have all the other stuff in a film. It can’t just be, ‘There’s a bad guy, there’s a monster.’ It has to have all the other stuff too.” But don’t expect it anytime soon.
“It’s not anywhere close to being ready,” she said. “I don’t write. I rewrite, but I don’t write, so that always puts me at the mercy of some enormous talent that comes out of the woodwork that somehow has the same obsessions as me.”
But it seems the sci-fi bug has caught Foster again (lest we forget, she starred in the solid “Contact” way back in 1997). Near the start of February she cast some doubts as to her participation in Neill Blomkamp‘s “Elysium” saying it wasn’t a done deal. However, at a press conference for “The Beaver” we attended at SXSW she confirmed her part in the upcoming film with a, “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”
“But it’s only 3 weeks of work,” she added which likely points to a supporting role, not a leading part. Of course, as with everything around the project, her role and the plot are being kept under lock and key. The shoot on that film is planning to start in July in Vancouver before moving to Mexico in the fall and it will have a long post-production period as the movie isn’t slated to hit theaters until March 8, 2013.
Anyhow, before she gets to “Elysium” or her own sci-fi pic, Foster will wrap up work on Roman Polanski’s drama “Carnage” (formerly known as “Gods Of Carnage“) with Kate Winslet, John C. Reilly and Christoph Waltz. And she’ll likely do some press rounds in advance of the May 20th release of “The Beaver.”