I've liked most of her movies, particularly the Brave One, but my favorite role has to be the character she played in the Inside Man. Awesome movie, awesome director and awesome actors.

Yes! I'm with you, Inside Man. def.

I loved her in Panic Room, though I'm not nearly as well versed in her work as I'd like to be.

I hate to be Mr. Obvious, but Silence of the Lambs, duh.

She's a fantastic actress and I wish she would take more roles.

For recent performances, Inside Man was great.

However, her greatest achievement might be Taxi Driver, because she shared the screen with Deniro and Keitel, and didn't get overwhelmed. And she was twelve. (IMO, Pacquin didn't do as well next to Keitel, Hunter, and Neil, though I like her.) Also, to affect that hard shell at twelve without the deadening life experiences of the character to draw on ... that's really impressive.

I may be a goofball, but I'm a big fan of Bugsy Malone.

I love Jodie Foster. My favorites are Nell and Silence of the Lambs.

Contact fo sho. One of my favorite movie lines of all time is when Hadden says, "First rule in government spending: why build one when you can have two at twice the price?"

I liked one of her first roles, as the tomboy in Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (Laura Dern also makes a cameo as a little girl drinking a milkshake at Mel's Diner).

And has someone taken John Hinckley's shoelaces away?

I just wrote a gender analysis of Clarice Starling for a class so I'm going to say Silence of the Lambs is definitely my favorite Jodie Foster flick.

Silence of the Lambs kicked my butt. It's awesome. Jodie is awesome. My dad is going to be heartbroken that she's gay though (hehehe).

I am a big fan of her performance in the original Freaky Friday. More recently, however, her performance in The Accused and Nell are amazing. And Contact is just one of my favorite movies anyway.

And just in case you want to throw up, I read on another news blog a post by some guy who said this makes her just a little harder to get and slightly less attractive. And he's never been a fan because she wasn't willing to play up her sexuality. Please. Vomit. Ugh.

I won't be around this weekend, since I'm heading to see the family, so feminist love and happy weekend to all :)

Nell! I forgot about that movie til now...great flick.

Little Girl Who Lived Down the Lane, anyone? Or Flight Plan, or Panic Room, or Contact ... too many to pick from. And I'm even old enough to remember her TV kid work from Courtship of Eddie's Father and others.
I can't say her coming out makes her any less attractive to me, I've always crushed on her and continue to do so.

Yay Jodie!

Personally, I adore Silence of the Lambs. She was great in it, but Hannibal Lecter is my all-time favorite character.

I like Jodie Foster, but I don't agree that there is anything inherently feminist in vigilantism. I mean, this storyline has been done again and again in action films (and she was seriously channeling Charles Bronson here). Is it really feminist just because it's a woman doing it?

Love her and she is beautiful.
Favorite scene in a movie -short Clarice in an elevator full of tall men in suits. I also like Contact a lot and The Brave One left me with an adrenaline rush way after it ended.

Yeah, Jodie! (This is coming from a man)

I don't know much of Jodie's movies, but one that I know and watched the most was The Accused. Her co-star is a real-life rape victim herself.

Blitzgal,
You have a point about vigilantism not being inherently feminist, but this film absolutely had an undertone of it. This plot had: a woman who had a restraining order against an abusive husband, a guy with basically a sex slave kept high on drugs who said "You are one of _those_ cunts," not to mention a guy who threatens to rape a woman with a knife. And all of these fuckers end up with lead in them.

However, whether violence should/should not be used when faced with these circumstances is a whole other discussion.

Right on, Shadow32. The Little Girl Who Lived Down the Lane is one of my all-time faves. Martin Sheen as a creepy sex predator? Teen girl as independent protagonist? Suspense, etc.? Love it. I wonder if it's on DVD these days.

And Nell. As soon as I read that, I had to way in the tay.

I've honestly never liked Jodie Foster. I have that with a few celebrities. I can't give any real reasons for it, I just don't like them.

That said, the article bothers me. It sounds as though they are complaining about Jodie not "doing more for lesbian visibility" and such.

How about because it's not her job? Who she sleeps with (obvious as it might have been) isn't anyone's business, straight or gay.

Just because she's gay doesn't mean she is then required to be the spokesperson for lesbians everywhere, and slightly derided for not doing such.

Personally, I don't care who she takes to her bed. It's not my business.

Hands down Silence of the Lambs. No competition. :-)

Jodie rocked in Panic Room. I went to see it with my mom, and I felt really empowered after seeing her character protect her kid without outside help. Her characters always stand up for themselves, and I love that.

Jodie rocked in Panic Room. I went to see it with my mom, and I felt really empowered after seeing her character protect her kid without outside help. Her characters always stand up for themselves, and I love that.

I agree with 88mph, both about not liking Jodie Foster as an actress and not believing that she has to be a spokeslesbian. I think people who get ticked about an out homosexual "not doing enough" to raise awareness about LGBTQ issues are trying to sound socially conscious, but they end up putting an emphasis on a person's sexuality and making it a public matter when it should be a private one.

I'm going to chime in with 88mph and FEMily. While I can understand the desire and the need to have successful models who look like you, you can't force people to be public with something that, quite frankly, is a private and personal matter.

Jodie Foster shouldn't have to serve someone else's will that she become the top lesbian role model, because really, that's like saying all lesbians are the same and all of them are going to automatically like and look up to Jodie Foster. I'm black and I sure as hell resent the fact that I'm supposed to automatically support other black public figures/entertainers just because we've got the same skin color. Many times I've said, "I don't like actor X" and people look at me like I just said I was Judas.

Once you become a role model you have to live as the masses say you should, because the first minute you step out of line or do something they don't approve of (without full apology) then they'll tear you down, gay, straight, black or white. It's a lot of pressure to live up to another's expectations, so I don't begrudge Jodie Foster for wanting to live her life in private.

It puts the lotion on the skin. It does this whenever it is told.

Oh yes, just so I follow the rules;) My favorite is Silence and for some reason Freaky Friday. They showed that to us in class one day in grade school (it was a Friday treat or something) and I remember enjoying that Jodie was a tomboy, since I was too:)

For me, it's a tie between "Silence of the Lambs" and "Contact". Jodie Foster rocks.

Go, Jody. She is awesome. And I would have to say, although Contact is an amazing film, I adore Jody's performance in Silence of the Lambs. Nobody else should have played Clarice Starling.

I love Jodie Foster. My favorite Foster role is either in Taxi Driver or Silence of the Lambs, because, duh. But I love her most for this episode of Inside the Actor's Studio where she explained that when she was prepping for Nell she did this one repetitive motion that for some reason made her cry every time she did it. I totally understand that feeling. She's awesome.

I have to respectfully disagree with those who don't think it's anyone's business whether she's out or not. The politics of outing are complex and I respect that she has chosen to keep her life private, but I still think it's an extremely positive thing to have such an incredible woman as a part of our GLBTQ community and that people know that.

OK. She takes fantastic roles, is comptely believable in them every time, and has a skate-punk band named after her. Frankly, this is just one more reason for me to crush on Jodie Foster.

"Completely believable," I meant.

Jodie Foster is awesome. But Courtney, Contact - seriously?? You had to sit through that whole move just to find out the alien was her flippin' dead dad.

I liked her a lot in Maverick. Wherein she steals a lot of money from Mel Gibson.

Silence of the Lambs, I was disappointed she didn't return in Hannibal. Julianne Moore was fine, but it wasn't quite the same.

Anyhoo, we were talking about assassins in one of my classes recently and she came up when we got to Reagan. This article just reminded me to add Taxi Driver to my Netflix queue. An odd but related question...is John Hinkley still alive?

OK, apparently he is and is living in a mental institution. He recently asked to be granted more freedoms to visit family and was denied. I wonder what effect this news will have on him if he finds out. I'm being serious, not snarky here. I majored in psych.

Not being a fan of the vigilante genre or the "criminal mastermind" genre (I consider "Hannibal" to be the anti-intellectualist flip side of the angelic simpleton "Forrest Gump"), my vote for the best Jodie Foster movie is "Contact."

In fact, "Contact" is probably my favorite movie of all movies. In it, a woman proves that she has a thinking head as well as a passionate heart, and she leads all humankind in a giant step forward in cosmic and self-understanding. You can't beat that.

Had to leave in the middle of The Accused. Too horrifying. I loved Nell, Contact and Silence of the Lambs.

While all the suggestions for best Jodie Foster movie have something going for them, my personal favorite is The Brave One. A week and a half ago, at age 60, I got my second-degree black belt in karate, so the idea of discovering the stranger within is fresh in my mind.

WRT Jovan1984's issue about the use of violence in some situations, I can do no better than quote something Jean-Paul Sartre said about the Nazis in 1948, which is every bit as timely now as it was then. Erica's actions are the only credible response.

"[These] have all demonstrated to us that Evil is not an appearance, that knowing its causes does not dispel it, that it is not opposed to Good as a confused idea is to a clear one, that it is not the effect of passions which might be cured, of a fear which might be overcome, of a passing aberration which might be excused, of an ignorance which might be enlightened, that it can in no way be turned, brought back, reduced, and incorporated into idealistic humanism.... Therefore, in spite of ourselves, we came to this conclusion, which will seem shocking to lofty souls: Evil cannot be redeemed."

(Jean-Paul Sartre, ‘Literature in Our Time,’ section iv, Partisan Review, XV, No. 6 [June 1948], p. 635 ff.)

The Guardian writer got it wrong, about the effects of coming out on another star's career: Ellen didn't have her sit com cancelled because she came out, coming out actually gave her sit com another year or so of life, and racheted up her career -- and she had little choice in the matter, in any case.

I was part of the Hollywood media, covering comedy, during that happening, and had met Ellen several times.

Media was aware Ellen was gay (or, at least I was for a good 5 years), but the Enquirer smear news rag was about to come out with it during her sit com run, while the producers were forcing Ellen to get a boyfriend on the show.

Also: her sit com was suffering from low ratings and about to be pulled. So, to circumvent the Enquirer shout out -- and give her sit com new life -- Ellen began "hinting" she was gay. On the Tonight Show she announced her big secret "I'm Lebanese!"

Well, the media frenzy began, and as Ellen had surmised the network couldn't cancel her sit com and look like bigots. Also the inching-toward-gay storylines gave the sitcom slightly better ratings.

Once the big episode aired in which Ellen announced she was gay over the loud speaker at an airport set both the media and the ratings peaked -- a sit com which had been limping along in the ratings before the gay buzz, went back to limping. When enough time had passed so that the network wouldn't shame themselves, it was cancelled.

And Ellen was the most famous lesbian in Hollywood, freed from a sit com that had been less than ably written and helmed to go on to something she herself created and produced: her own talk show.

Comedians are all about control (and usually understand their own strengths and weaknesses), all want their own sit coms or talk shows: with emphasis on "their own."

Coming out actually gave Ellen leverage in Hollywood.

The Guardian writer got it wrong, about the effects of coming out on another star's career: Ellen didn't have her sit com cancelled because she came out, coming out actually gave her sit com another year or so of life, and racheted up her career -- and she had little choice in the matter, in any case.

I was part of the Hollywood media, covering comedy, during that happening, and had met Ellen several times.

Media was aware Ellen was gay (or, at least I was for a good 5 years), but the Enquirer smear news rag was about to come out with it during her sit com run, while the producers were forcing Ellen to get a boyfriend on the show.

Also: her sit com was suffering from low ratings and about to be pulled. So, to circumvent the Enquirer shout out -- and give her sit com new life -- Ellen began "hinting" she was gay. On the Tonight Show she announced her big secret "I'm Lebanese!"

Well, the media frenzy began, and as Ellen had surmised the network couldn't cancel her sit com and look like bigots. Also the inching-toward-gay storylines gave the sitcom slightly better ratings.

Once the big episode aired in which Ellen announced she was gay over the loud speaker at an airport set both the media and the ratings peaked -- a sit com which had been limping along in the ratings before the gay buzz, went back to limping. When enough time had passed so that the network wouldn't shame themselves, it was cancelled.

And Ellen was the most famous lesbian in Hollywood, freed from a sit com that had been less than ably written and helmed to go on to something she herself created and produced: her own talk show.

Comedians are all about control (and usually understand their own strengths and weaknesses), all want their own sit coms or talk shows: with emphasis on "their own."

Coming out actually gave Ellen leverage in Hollywood.

You inspired me to find this blast from the past, and a new slogan for the week: "So long suckers!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCfsQwX_U08