Natalie Portman to Star in Western ‘Jane Got a Gun’ for Director Lynne Ramsay (Exclusive)

Natalie Portman Star Western 'Jane Got — Natalie Portman Headshot - P 2012
Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images

Natalie Portman is attached to star in and produce Jane Got a Gun, a Western written by Brian Duffield that popped up on the Black List of top screenplays. Lynne Ramsay is attached to direct, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

The movie is still coming together, but sources say a bidding war has erupted in Cannes as CAA, which is packaging the project, has quietly shopped it around. Multiple financiers and foreign sales agents — all of whom are gathered on the Croisette for the film festival and market — are in the mix, along with several studios back in Los Angeles.

The film could end up being financed by a combination of equity, studio money and foreign presales. People were looking at the project last week in Los Angeles, but the dealmaking moved to the South of France once the festival got underway.

Ramsay was most recently in theaters with last year’s acclaimed indie film We Need to Talk About Kevin.

Jane Got a Gun centers on a woman whose outlaw husband returns home riddled with bullet wounds and barely alive. When her husband’s gang eventually tracks him down to finish the job, she is forced to reach out to an ex-lover and ask if he will help defend her farm.

Portman is repped by CAA, Duffield by Gersh and Circle of Confusion, and Ramsay by WME.

Email: Borys.Kit@thr.com, Pamela.McClintock@thr.com