Reese Witherspoon consolidated her reputation as America's golden girl and one of the most influential actresses in Hollywood with news that she will produce and possibly star in a true-crime drama about a high school killing.

As America continues to grieve over last month's Virginia Tech killings, the largest gun massacre in the country's history, Witherspoon's production company Type A Films announced it is developing Under The Bridge.

The project is based on Rebecca Godfrey's account of the 1997 slaying of high school student Reena Virk, the daughter of Indian immigrants who lived in a sleepy Canadian town in British Columbia. Catherine Hardwicke, whose credits include Thirteen and The Nativity Story, is in talks to direct.

Perhaps nobody else in Hollywood except the critically adored and commercially successful Witherspoon would have the nerve or the clout to attempt something like this. In fact, two US releases have been postponed indefinitely in the wake of the April 16 shootings. The shelved films are The Killer Within, a documentary about a professor who reveals how he embarked upon a murderous rampage as a college student decades earlier, and Dark Matter, a drama starring Meryl Streep in which an embittered Chinese goes haywire on campus.

Another title, the upcoming ensemble drama Winged Creatures, has also sparked concern over its suitability. Guy Pearce, Forest Whitaker and Kate Beckinsale star as strangers who try to make sense of a random killing spree at a restaurant. The film's producers will be looking to put together financing on the project at the Cannes film market later in the month.

Witherspoon won the Academy Award last year for playing June Carter Cash in Walk the Line, and her credits include Legally Blonde and Election. Her upcoming projects include the horror film Our Family Trouble, the modern fairy tale Penelope, and romantic comedy Sammy.