Algerian filmmaker Rachid Bouchareb brought his film Outside the Law to the Oscars on Sunday, nominated for Best Foreign Language film, but lost to Susanne Bier's Danish entry In A Better World. All the same, Bouchareb is unbowed; he's gearing up to make two English-language films in the United States in the next year, the first one to star Sienna Miller as a Chicago housewife who runs off to Las Vegas to enter a dance competition. According to Deadline shooting on the film, titled Just Like A Woman, will start on June 13, with Iranian actress Golshifteh Farahani and Roschdy Zem co-starring.
Miller, who's currently acting onstage in London, told Deadline that the director is "one of those people who understand the medium of film in a way that’s not manipulative but that’s honest and raw. As a director he’s capable of anything. The kinds of films he makes are the ones I like to watch.” After Just Like A Woman he'll start prep work on Belleville's Cop, a comedy starring Queen Latifah as an LAPD cop working opposite a French-Arab transplant, to be played by Jamel Debbouze. Both films are likely to be a lot lighter than Outside the Law, which drew protests at Cannes thanks to its depiction of the Algerian independence movement of the 1950s.
Much as Bouchareb seems to be a rising filmmaker to watch, I'm especially interesting to see what Miller might make of the role. She's spent a lot of time onstage recently, after a series of films that never seemed to quite live up to the promise people saw in her. But she consistently makes interesting choices in picking roles, and this oddball character might be the one to help her break out of the "tabloid fixture/pretty girl" rut she's been in for the past few years. For whatever reason she still seems worth rooting for.
