The Big Renée Zellweger News? She's Started Filming a New Movie

Jordan Zakarin
Updated

Zellweger in Mississippi on Oct. 27

Perhaps lost in all the hoopla over Renée Zellweger’s reemergence last week was the news that she’s actually going to be making a new movie.

The actress, who is best known for playing Bridget Jones and winning an Oscar for 2003’s Cold Mountain, will star in the upcoming faith-based film Same Kind of Different As Me, which started filming Monday in Mississippi. The movie “tells the story of an art dealer (played by Greg Kinnear) who befriends a homeless man (Djimon Hounsou) in order to save his struggling relationship with his wife (Zellweger).”

Zellweger has not been seen on the big screen since 2010’s horror film Case 39. (Her 2010 drama My Own Love Song didn’t get a theatrical release.) Before Same Kind hits theaters, Zellweger will get her career comeback started with The Whole Truth, a courtroom drama featuring Keanu Reeves and Gugu Mbatha-Raw. When it’s released in 2015, it will mark the first time in half a decade that Zellweger has appeared in a film or scripted TV show.

The movie news comes on the heels of a red carpet appearance on Oct. 20 that turned into a week’s worth of internet commentary. The actress, 45, looked different than she had in the past, sparking speculation and debate that she called “silly” in a statement to People.

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Renée Zellweger at Elle’s Women in Hollywood event on Oct. 20

For Kinnear, the Christian-themed film genre is becoming a special — and lucrative — niche. The actor starred in this spring’s surprise hit Heaven Is For Real, based on a book by Lynn Vincent, who is also a co-author of the novel on which Same Kind is based.

Long a market for faded stars looking for work, the Christian film sector has become more competitive in recent years, kicked off by History Channel’s series The Bible, which was edited down into a big screen feature called Son of God that earned $67 million worldwide. While other Christian-themed movies like The Identical stumbled this year, Heaven is For Real made $101 million.

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