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Lber - // What Jodie Foster did so well was to basically play the straight man to both Anthony Hopkins and Ted Levine and she just laid back in the groove and still had enough presence to not get swallowed up by these wild, over the top characters. //
I think you do Ms Foster a mis-service here.
If memory serves, she only appeared in about five scenes with Anthony Hopkins, and one interactive scene with Ted Levine, if you don;t count the scene where she kills him.
The rest of her scenes develop her character and show her tenacity - I don;t think she is a foil at all in this film.