Obsession breakout Inde Navarrette ignites buzz after meeting Michael Mann and an X-Men director about future projects

To say there's a buzz around Obsession right now would be understating things a bit. This little indie horror flick, directed by Curry Barker and starring Inde Navarrette, has gone and completely upended expectations—not something you see every week at the box office. What started out as a film costing just $750,000 to make has now raked in more than $400 million worldwide. For a film that didn't even crack a million to start, that's frankly absurd (in a good way), and it means Obsession now wears the crown for the highest-grossing micro-budget film of all time. Bruce Lee's Enter the Dragon was the previous champ, but that's been very much left in the rearview now.

If you think all the studios were snoozing when this film was up for grabs, you'd be mistaken. Focus Features saw what was coming and picked up the US rights for $15 million—a pretty hefty chunk, easily dwarfing the original budget. Our own Chris Bumbray thought it lived up to the hype, giving it an 8 out of 10 and calling the film 'a slam-bang indie horror gem.' Can't argue with that.

Inde Navarrette: Out of Nowhere to Everywhere

But let's be honest: while everyone’s keen to hail Barker as the next big director, just as much attention is on Inde Navarrette, Obsession’s breakout star. She’s picked up some serious momentum thanks to a performance that’s best described as 'delightfully unhinged.' Apparently Hollywood collectively agrees, because her diary’s been filling up faster than you can say 'franchise.'

The talk right now is that she's already been in the room with Jake Schreier—the bloke who recently wrapped up directing Thunderbolts* for Marvel, and is on board to tackle Marvel’s next big project: the relentlessly discussed X-Men reboot. When Navarrette was asked by Nylon if she’d be interested in joining the Marvel machine, she kept it plain and simple: 'I would.'

She hasn't stopped there, either. Word is, Navarrette has sat down for a meeting with Michael Mann. That’s right, Heat’s Michael Mann. The internet’s already spinning up theories—could she end up in Heat 2? There’s a character, Gabriela, from the source novel who’d be a tidy fit for her: Gabriela is the daughter of Elisa, who’s romantically linked to the thief Neil McCauley (Robert De Niro in the original film, if your memory needs a jog).

What’s Next? Here’s What We Know

• Newly confirmed: Navarrette has already bagged her next role. She’ll star in Invertigo, directed by Matthias Hoene.
• The premise: a bunch of thrill-seeking teenagers pressure a young amusement park worker into letting them onto a rollercoaster before the thing’s even open to the public. Of course, it all goes sideways—a mechanical failure leaves them stranded high above the ground, and, as if that’s not enough, the ordeal dredges up all sorts of repressed trauma and keeps the chaos coming.

There you have it: Indie horror gold, a rising star with half of Hollywood knocking at her door, and her next project lined up—rollercoaster-related terror mandatory. Someone hand Inde Navarrette a calendar, she might need a new one.