ScreenDaily reports that director Lynn Ramsay will helm her first project since she left the Natalie Portman-led Western “Jane Got a Gun.”
Ramsay will direct “You Were Never Really Here,” a thriller revolving around a tormented war veteran (Joaquin Phoenix) with a troubled past. The man becomes a freelance rescuer of women trafficked into the sex trade. As Screen Daily describes, “When the extraction of a girl from a Manhattan brothel goes wrong, a storm of violence and corrupt power is unleashed against him, stirring a vengeance that may be his awakening.”
Ramsay will direct from her own adaptation of the novella by Jonathan Ames. Her last feature was the 2011 Golden Globe-nominated “We Need to Talk About Kevin,” which starred Tilda Swinton. Ramsay then signed on to direct “Jane Got a Gun,” but exited the project just before shooting began under mysterious circumstances. Producers later filed a lawsuit against her, which was settled in 2014.
UPDATE: Amazon Studios has come out on top of the bidding and will be releasing the film.