Add one more old-school Hollywood vet to the list of stars rebelling against the popular superhero genre. Jodie Foster has starred in acclaimed films like The Silence of the Lambs, The Accused and Taxi Driver, which is directed by outspoken critic of the comic book movie genre, Martin Scorsese. Foster will be starring in the upcoming season of HBO’s hit show True Detective and is currently getting Academy Award hype for her supporting role in Nyad from Netflix. Foster does say that she is a fan of some superhero movies she’s seen, although she also states that they aren’t life-changing works for her.
Foster recently spoke with Elle Magazine, and according to Variety, she views the genre as just another Hollywood phase. “It’s a phase. It’s a phase that’s lasted a little too long for me, but it’s a phase, and I’ve seen so many different phases. Hopefully people will be sick of it soon. The good ones—like Iron Man, Black Panther, The Matrix—I marvel at those movies, and I’m swept up in the entertainment of it, but that’s not why I became an actor. And those movies don’t change my life. Hopefully there’ll be room for everything else.”
However, Foster is not opposed to overly fantastical, high-concept films. The Panic Room star glowed about Best Picture winner Everything Everywhere All at Once. “The Daniels. They made my favorite movie perhaps of all time, Everything Everywhere All at Once. That’s the film that I will return to over and over again whenever I feel depressed or sad. I first saw it with one of my sons, and we held hands and pinched each other and cried for 45 minutes afterward. And then I saw it with my other son a week later, and it just opened a portal of connection and understanding and hope. He started telling me everything from his high school that he’d never told me, and we were walking in the rain crying and opening up. And I was like, ‘This is what film can do.’”
Foster stars in Nyad with Annette Bening, who starred alongside Brie Larson in the MCU movie Captain Marvel. Nyad is available to stream on Netflix, and True Detective season 4 is slated to premiere on HBO on January 14, 2024.