Nothing prepared me for when Charli XCX went full method… by disappearing from screens entirely.
Seven films. Zero releases. Not even a teaser to prove she can act. That's the confounding cinematic résumé of pop provocateur Charli XCX. Yet somehow, she just landed a leading role in the next film from Takashi Miike—the Japanese auteur whose movies make Tarantino look like Mister Rogers.
This is the film equivalent of giving someone their driver's license before they've ever turned the ignition. Except the car is on fire. And the road is lined with chainsaw-wielding yakuza.
Miike doesn't do safe.
Known for Audition, Ichi the Killer, and 13 Assassins, Miike's cinema thrives on chaos, carnage, and characters who live at the edge of reality. So the news that he's casting Charli—who's still unproven on screen—isn't just surprising. It's genre-defying.
Why her? Why now?
Maybe it's not a gamble. Maybe it's a pattern.
Let's look back. Lady Gaga in A Star Is Born—Oscar-nominated on her first major outing. Rihanna in Battleship—critically demolished, but her star power survived. Musicians crossing into film is Hollywood tradition, but the success rate? Dicey.
More importantly, none of them shot seven films before a single one saw daylight. According to Variety, Charli's already wrapped projects include The Moment, 100 Nights of Hero, Faces of Death, and more. All in post-production limbo. Some indefinitely.
The most infamous of these is Faces of Death, helmed by Daniel Goldhaber (How to Blow Up a Pipeline), which has been reportedly stuck in post since 2023. Charli's role in Greta Gerwig's Narnia reboot also slipped through her fingers—lost to Sex Education‘s Emma Mackey after a “bombed” audition, per industry chatter.
So again—why is Miike, of all directors, putting her on screen?
The uncomfortable truth: This might not be about acting.
It could be branding. Image. Energy. Charli XCX, with her alt-pop chaos and internet-savvy persona, feels like a Miike character come to life. Not a trained thespian. A living mood board. A vessel for something more raw. And if there's one director who values unhinged over polished, it's Miike.
He's also no stranger to oddball casting. In 2014's Over Your Dead Body, he placed model-turned-actress Ko Shibasaki in a haunting psychological slow burn—and it worked. Maybe he sees something in Charli the rest of us haven't been allowed to yet.
But until something gets released, we're still in the dark.
So here's the big question: Is this the beginning of a pop star's acting redemption arc? Or the latest entry in Hollywood's cautionary tales file?
Either way, you'll want to remember this moment. Because if Miike's 103rd film delivers—and Charli kills it—it won't be the music industry that's trembling.
