Francis Lawrence circles former Darren Aronofsky/David Fincher project 'Red Sparrow'

Director Francis Lawrence is moving his sight from mockingjays towards eying a different bird altogether. The filmmaker most recently notable for helming The Hunger Games sequels may direct the Russian C.I.A. thriller Red Sparrow as his follow-up.

Lawrence would become the third director attached to the Jason Matthews adaptation following David Fincher and Darren Aronofsky. The latter enters talks around 2013, while Fincher entered the discussion just last year. His production would've reunited him with Rooney Mara, but negotiations didn't work out. No matter, though, for the two will end up working with one another again through the HBO series Utopia.

Deadline reported on the matter some days back, but between other directing headlines like Ben Affleck calling the shots on solo Batman movie and Phil Lord & Chris Miller making a young Han Solo movie, the word appeared lost in the shuffle. It happens.

Still under a screenplay by Oscar-nominated American Hustle scribe Eric Warren Singer, Red Sparrow is a modern-day government suspense drama centered on a Russian spy falling for CIA agent and how she becomes tempted to become a double agent. Mashing the dark tones established in some of his other features, like Constantine and I Am Legend, and telling another tale of conflicted love in a time of panic, like his Hunger Games movies and Water for Elephants, Lawrence may often become a hit-or-miss director, but this seems well-catered to his forte.

This isn't a done deal, however. As he ties up the final knots on his November 20th release, he has a number of different options from which he can choose. Those would include reuniting with Jennifer Lawrence for the James Cameron-produced The Dive or, hell, possibly making different adaptation, one for Homer's Odyssey. Chances are, he has even more offers thrown his way too.

Image courtesy of Jennifer Graylock/INFphoto.com